273. Orelle.

 

  Orelle is probably the restaurant that Birmingham has been waiting for. It’s the restaurant that The Grand Hotel should have had. It’s spectacular, breath-taking, chic, smart. The people who work there look the part. And it has a fine, sensible à la carte menu which features luxurious items which make it worthwhile going out to dine. It is where fine dining in Birmingham in the mid-2020s should be heading.

  I ordered a Monkey 47 and tonic and the charming staff, one of whom had worked previously in the now sadly closed Pulperia, were swift to deliver two tasty gougères and some fine bread to the table.

 My chosen starter of dressed white crab looking very pretty with slices of rainbow radish and nicely textured with thin slices of seasonal fresh-tasting apple with buttermilk and lovage emulsion and almond was a hit, a palpable hit. Almost perfect - there was a single tiny piece of shell in the crab - this was an admirable, cheering, scintillating dish though I should have preferred it if my apéritif had arrived rather earlier than half way through the first course. The bar seems to need to settle in a little more though the kitchen seems to have hit the road running.

  I could not resist choosing the Cornish turbot as my main course. Served with gem lettuce, confit fennel for texture, all sitting under globe artichoke and with a gorgeous crab bisque (this was made from the brown meat, I was told, of the crab which had provided the white meat for my starter and I replied that I liked the consequent symmetry of that use of ingredients). To be persnickety, I thought my turbot was just slightly over and had not so much flavour as I had hoped for but the bisque was robust and rumbustious and the whole was delightful.

 And so to the joy of the dessert trolley which is clearly staging a comeback in the city, Harborne Kitchen having reinstituted the tradition some time ago. And what a great pleasure it was to sit back and admire it and the pinks and the chocolates and the whites and the oranges and the yellows spread out on its palate. I chose the magnificent choux pastry - really this was a Paris Brest - its exterior delightfully crispy and with it the delights of caramelised apple and mascarpone and a little jug of caramel sauce to pour on it and bring it all together. These were real desserts made by a real pastry chef. This was not a matter of a mousse and some crumble and a bit of chocolate ganache - this was fine patisserie and exactly how a meal should end.

  Perhaps a couple of mignardises to accompany the coffee would have been a nice touch but what did it matter?, instead I had the most exciting views of Birmingham on offer all laid out before me to enjoy while the coffee went down.

Rating:- 🌞 🌞