437. The End Of Purnell’s.

 At 1000AM on Monday 14 October 2024 Glynn Purnell announced via social media that his restaurant, Purnell’s, in Cornwall Street had served its last diners at close of service on Saturday 12 October and that the restaurant was now permanently closed.

  He was interviewed an hour later on the BBC West Midlands station by Kathryn Stanczyszyn and repeated that which he had stated in the social media and identified a number of reasons for his decision to end the 17 years of fine dining he had been serving up to the citizens of Birmingham and from further afield in Cornwall street. 

  We know well Purnell’s story before opening Jessica’s in Edgbaston with owners Diane and Keith Stevenson and this had included a period of work as Chef de Partie at Andreas Antona’s Simpsons and for Claude Bosi at Hibiscus in Ludlow. Jessica’s was opened in 2004 and, with Purnell in the kitchen, it was awarded a Michelin star in 2005, joining Simpsons as one of only two Birmingham restaurants to have been awarded the accolade up until then. Jessica’s closed in 2007 after Purnell decided to open his own restaurant which he did in May 2007, quite reasonably naming it after himself, and Purnell’s was awarded a Michelin star in the 2009 edition of the Michelin Guide (announced in 2008). Purnell’s retained the star until its closure.

  Purnell became a local and national culinary celebrity with numerous appearances on television and in the press and opened, and sometimes closed, other restaurants as he was eventually to do with his flagship fine dining restaurant itself as the gastronomic climate changed, costs rose, and the fall off of diners able to, or prepared to, pay significant prices for tasting menus and their ilk.

  Purnell’s is survived by its younger siblings, Plates By Purnell’s in Edmund Street and the upmarket public house/restaurant The Mount in Henley in Arden.

  A look at Blog 413 (28 June 2024) may provide the reader with at least one reason why Purnell’s finally had to close. It was still very good but it was tired, the menu had lost its thrill, its humour and wit, its flair and imagination, its sense of excitement, its oomph. Restaurants rely on their old, faithful customers coming back time and time again and while they like to see familiar old favourites on the menu, they also want novelty and for me the menu was too repetitive drawing on old glories. I’m not convinced that Glynn Purnell had not lost his interest in it all to some extent. When something’s tired and elderly, it’s time to let it rest with its memories of the glory days of fine, exciting, witty experiences and so to move on.

 And in response to the news I made a reservation to visit Plates by Purnell’s the very next day. Somehow it seemed the decent thing to do.

   I had dined just a month ago at Plates with a regular dining companion and we were very impressed. Our chosen dishes were pleading and represented good value. My only real problem with the restaurant was the general lack of space there which makes it feel just a little unwelcoming though that is certainly not a comment that one could make about the excellent front of house staff there.

  We indeed had little to complain about on this occasion - we enjoyed the platter of embutidos (cured meats) which admittedly was more a matter of curation than of culinary skill; we enjoyed some inoffensive albondigas, some cheese and basil  croquetas, some fine-looking patatas bravas (which to be fair were more patatas than bravas) and some nicely seasoned gambas al ajillo. I chose the pistachio dessert - a pistachio foam with honey and tuiles - though it only served to emphasise how unrewarding are the restaurant’s desserts. Generally we enjoyed ourselves and I felt that I shoukd like to return sooner rather than later.

  Which brings us to my solo visit to Plates one month after my previous dining experience there. In many ways I wish I had not decided to dine there. I repeated my previous order of albondigas and requested chicken thigh with romesco sauce (it was not available), ‘chip  de trufa’ - potato with truffle mayonnaise (I was informed it was a single chip which sounded a little insubstantial for £5 to say the least so I opted for good old patatas bravas, croquetas de queso y albahaca and, in the absence of the chicken, calamares with alioli. First the good news - the croquetas were good - nice and crispy though not bursting with flavour, the patatas bravas were indisputably lacklustre, the albondigas were much as one would expect them to be but the crispy squid was awful - true the coating was pleasingly crispy but the squid inside was vile, decidedly miscooked in a way which truly gave it an unchewable rubber band texture. Oh dear! This was not the standard one expects from a Michelin recommended restaurant. *What is going on at these Purnell restaurants?

   The squid was the single most unpleasant piece of food I have put in my mouth in a restaurant since a trip to China in, if I remember rightly, 1993 when I wrestled with a ghastly, grey piece of sea cucumber which had been served as a delicacy. The stuff that nightmares are made on. I pointed out the extreme chewiness of the squid to the waiter and no charge was quite rightly made for the dish and there the matter should end except that one is bound to wonder how the Michelin grade kitchen could let such a horror escape from it.

  The squid had rather knocked me back and I did not feel I could risk a dessert. Glynn Purnell needs to get a grip on this. Hopefully it’s a one off.

Rating - 🌛🌛.

  More bad news. The friend .with whom I dined on the first of my reported visit to Plates usually joins me for a ‘3 and half ounces of pleasure’ at The Alchemist prior to our sauntering off to some worthy dining establishment for our regular lunch. He was not with me on my second visit but having 45 minutes to pass prior to my reservation time it seemed like a very good idea to pop into the Alchemist and renew my acquaintance with that very soothing cocktail. Alas! I was informed that 3 and half oz was no longer being made. An instant state of crestfallenness set in. But it was suggested I substitute the Pleasure with a June Bug, the ingredients of which included gin and banana and coconut. This was good - who can resist gin with some of the ingredients of a Planter’s punch? But the embracing rum of the Pleasure would have been a nice soother on a grim, cool English mid-autumn afternoon. Perhaps June is the best month for glugging a June Bug unless you’re in Jamaica where, I guess, the weather makes any time fine. 

  We like to close with good news. A near neighbour location of Plates, the now closed Urban Coffee where Ben Tesh staged pop ups in 2016 prior to opening Folium has posters in the windows which indicate that Tiger Bites Pig will be moving in - just what the restaurant needs -a lot more space.

402. Pre-theatre Dinner At Purnell’s Plates.

 

  For the third time in six days it’s off to the theatre I go. But now, back in Birmingham, this time to the Birmingham Repertory Theatre to see the theatre version of Bruce Robinson’s sublimely comic, excruciatingly enjoyable classic film set in the dying days of the 1960s. Withnail And I. Expectations are high, after all the Royal Shakespeare Company, with its usual license to bowdlerise to the Nth degree, has not been let loose on this gem, worthy of Shakespeare himself and indeed quoting as it does from Hamlet at the very end of it as Withnail is left alone, fated perhaps never to play the Dane.

 But, as I wrote above, expectations are high, anticipation is electric and  a pre-theatre dinner is needed though I have no intention of demanding, to accompany it, the finest wines known to man. It is some time since I have eaten at Purnell’s Plates in Edmund Street, a short walk from the Rep, and it seems like an ideal place to start the evening which, incidentally, is warm, dry and pleasingly seasonal for late spring day. And so to Purnell’s Plates, to be greeted by Adrien Garnier, restaurant manager at Purnell’s, sitting outside in the early evening warmth with, I expect, other staff prior to heading off for Cornwall Street prior to evening service there

  I am shown to my table by the painting of the bull which reminds me of just how many bulls there are in the city. And so to the menu.

     Switching from present to past tense, I ordered four dishes from the menu which proved to be a little more than my advancingly elderly stomach had full room for but my mouth and taste buds felt differently from my stomach and welcomed all-comers. First to arrive at the table was a plate of nicely crispy and robustly flavoured cheese and basil croquetas and I set about demolishing these little gems with pleasurable gusto washed down with a complementary glass of cava and then some Spanish beer.

   Then, along came four beautifully meaty and happily spicy beef and pork albondigas served with a keenly tasty tomato sauce and some patatas bravas which did not have so much heat to them as I would have liked though the finely shaved cheese on top of them gave them added flavour. Finally along came a lovely piece of pan-fried sea bream - its meat nicely cooked and snow-white - with saffron and garlic and a couple of rather insubstantial potatoes and two or three segments of sliced, sweet piquillo peppers. 

  I eschewed the irritating deconstructed crème Catalan which I was surprised to find had hung on to its place on the menu and instead opted for the Basque cheesecake. This was sensibly sized and a fair representation of the dish and, after it, I was ready to amble along to Centenary Square to see the play.

  It took a while to accept that the two very frantic young men on the stage were Withnail and Marwood though they spoke almost the very same lines as Richard E Grant and Paul McGann did in the movie. At times Withnail was more Bertie Wooster than Grant’s far more subtle, more deeply upper crust, viciously cynical rendition of the part and poor Marwood just was not beautiful enough. But the lads did their best and made me laugh at times though that was more to do with the crushingly hilarious script than the acting to be fair. And how could the actor playing Uncle Monty, a fraction of Richard’s Griffith’s scene-filling bulk, ever hope to fully win over a Withnail and I aficionado when a picture of the salacious, predatory film version of Uncle Monty is lodged firmly and eternally in the mind’s eye?

  But it was an entertaining evening with great efforts put into the costumes and the scenery and scene-changing remarkable. The Rep had certainly put in the necessary effort on this one and it showed.

361. Spain In Bristol - Gambas and Bravas.

 

  I am invited to an acquaintance’s birthday meal annually in a rather cheerless commuter town near Bristol and it’s difficult to find somewhere reasonably priced in the area where one can stay with one’s dog. Hence I usually stay in an overpriced moderately mediocre gaff belonging to a continental chain (which promises more than it delivers) near Temple Meads and which reflects closely the decline of England’s hospitality industry as the number of little pleasures, comforts and services the hotel supplies to its guests are gradually taken away from the guests (do they think we don’t notice?) while the room rate increases rapidly. But enough of that. 

  There are a number of recommendable places at which to eat Sunday lunch in Bristol but on my annual November visits over the last couple of years I have eaten at Gambas in Cargo 2 in Wapping Wharf and a very pleasing Sunday lunch I have eaten there on both occasions. So, though I was tempted to branch out and do something different this year, I once more made a reservation for lunch at Gambas, the restaurant being within a Sunday afternoon relaxed pace walking distance from my hotel and the weather being what it is in this late autumn and doing its best to dissuade one from travelling very far to other parts of the city. The was a strong wind and frequent outbursts of charmless drizzle.

  And so, though it may be repetitive, here is another report of Sunday lunch at Wapping Wharf. The interior of Gambas, warm, atmospheric and inviting, looking particularly attractive as one enters it, with  the wind howling outside and the rain lashing Cargo 2, a conglomoration of independent businesses all located in a large two storey building constructed from containers. The lighting is just right, the warmth (including that of the welcome) is just right,and the diners are just rightand give the restaurant its identity. 

  There’s a very self-aware, flamboyant middle-aged couple, self-consciously Bohemian in appearance, both wearing fancy hats (the man determinedly ignoring ancient etiquette that men do not wear their hats at the dining table, though, I suppose, he might just have been hiding his baldness); a man in his thirties eating a bavette steak, cutting off pieces for his small daughter who was sitting by him at the counter and dressed in a pretty floral frock; a good-looking, well-healed couple in their early thirties, looking to me like a pair of young doctors on a first date, he, neatly bearded and trendily bespectacled, talking too much and she, at times, looking bemused (I considered whispering to him that he was trying too hard); everyone there well off and living the Bristol life. Through the widow, a replica of Cabot’s ship, the Matthew, could be spotted through the crepuscular mirk of the afternoon, Atmosphere. Atmosphere. Atmosphere. If I were a painter I would have run riot recording on canvass this scene with its interesting characters and I would have felt like Toulouse Lautrec at the Folies Bergère.

  There was a regular menu and a special menu made up of small plates as on previous visits; some of the items on the latter were not available, I was, I suppose, having a rather late lunch. I could not resist the salt cod croqueta which was cooked to be enticingly crispy with a nice creamy, subtly flavoured interior. The patatas bravas were, it’s true, a little less bravas than I would have liked but they were generously portioned and went well with the tender, tasty, accurately cooked 84 day aged Belmont Estate beef picanha which was aptly matched with a smooth celeriac purée and a jus which I might have liked to have had just a little more of.

   Gambas is the sister restaurant to the equally excellent Bravas in Clifton, a stone’s throw away from Clifton’s railway station and nestled comfortably in the heart of this profoundly middle class hipster community. Clifton is an upmarket version of Moseley or Kings Heath and where Stirchley or Harborne may strive to radiate shabby chicness, Clifton is head and shoulders above them both in the obvious wealth of the locals and their success in recreating an English Bohemia for the 2020s. It is clearly a socialist population living very comfortably under the Conservative government which they would no doubt be the first to complain about. 

  I lunched at Bravas in early August on a warm and bright sunny day which added to the pleasure of it all. Given the choice of eating outside or in the interior dining area I chose the latter but was sat at the window looking out so it seemed that I got the best of both worlds. I was able to sit watching what the locals were up to - though this was midweek there appeared to be so many young people lounging about, doing nothing useful apart from immersing themselves in whatever was appearing on their mobile telephone screens. Why on earth were these people not at work?

  I turned my attention away from the uselessness of youth and concentrated on the menu which had many of the same dishes as Gambas, the meals were being  as small plates, to be delivered to the table as and when they were available. In view of the heat of the day, a cold Gazpacho-like soup proved to be appropriate and was served with a remarkably generously sized piece of tuna and an egg. This was excellent and if it wasn’t authentically Spanish then it should have been. This was looking very promising. 

  I inevitably opted for patatas bravas which were very good, crispy and nicely salted and served separately from the spicy sauce. Salt-grilled wild red prawns were very well cooked with garlic and chilli and the croquetas I ordered were crispy and very tasty. Best of all, and a contender for my dish of the year,  was the fabulous, quite superb presa a la plancha, delicious beyond imagination Iberico pork with charred rosemary. A very fine dish.

  The denizens of Bristol are very fortunate in having Bravas and Gambas on their doorstep. We have Purnell’s Plates which I have seen described as serving authentic Spanish dishes but to be honest, and it pains me to write it, the restaurant really does have some way to go before matching the Bristol duo.

Rating:- 🌝🌝

300. Purnell’s Plates. A New Bull In Town.

 

  When it comes to Mediterranean cuisine, unlike Greek and Italian food which I find to be, respectively, excruciatingly dull and extremely overrated, I do derive great pleasure from being presented with a plate on which almost any Spanish dish is presented. Spanish cuisine in Birmingham has been significantly unrepresented so I was thrilled that the Yummy Brummie had identified a hole in the market and realised that he was the man to fill it. Hence I found myself ambling along Edmund Street on the first day that Purnell’s Plates opened to the public. It was advertised as selling Spanish tapas which for me at least was highly alluring. 

  The interior is mildly claustrophobic, being a narrow ‘L’ shape opening up into a small square place at the rear, The decor is smart and the restaurant is littered with artefacts such as bull’s horns to remind the diner that this is a little piece of Spain in the city where bulls are embraced so enthusiastically. The walls have art which also generally, though not entirely, emphasise the theme of Iberia. The long bar is the first sight to greet the customer as they enter the restaurant and I was pleased to recognise some old faces there including Adrien Garnier, restaurant manager at the mother ship, Purnell’s, who said he was there for a couple of days to keep an eye on the opening.

  Seated comfortably at my table I noted that the opening lunchtime was a a little slow with a total of only six customers, including myself, there during the time I sat and lunched. I asked for a cocktail but the bar was not yet ready to serve them so instead I had a glass of Madri, a Spanish beer which was perfectly drinkable. I was rather excited about delving into the menu and getting on with the pleasing selection of dishes.  First to arrive was my Anchoas en tostada served with a generous helping of delicious pesto which nicely balanced the fish’s salty delightfulness and which I gobbled down with relish while I waited for my other dishes to arrive. 

  Then the main dishes came out, sauntering their way to the table with a self-assuredness that they were going to pleasure the diners who had ordered them in a comforting, full-bodied, rustic sort of way albeit with some sophistication that only came to the fore when the taste buds had got into gear. Naughty, spicy patatas bravas; very nicely cooked cod, bacalao al pil pil, in a pil pil sauce (garlic, paprika, parsley) and the most triumphant of them all, Chorizo al vino tinto, chunky pieces of spicy chorizo raised to a whole new level by the accompanying, remarkably delicious red wine sauce which was dark and shiny and unctious - I would eat that dish anytime.

  What came next was something of a surprise. I thought of finishing off with crema Catalona but what emerged from the kitchen appeared to be a dramatic genetic mutation of the dish I knew, recognised and loved. Perhaps Purnell’s chefs knew more about it than I (and the rest of the world) did. Ah yes! It was a deconstructed crema Catalana, that was it. There was a heavily whipped cream with shards of caramel emerging erect from it. It just didn’t seem right. In fact it seemed rather lazy. It was pleasant enough but my message would be - reconstruct your crema Catalana as soon as possible.

     The crema Catalana apart, this was an enjoyable meal. Reservations have already been made for a return visit. Rating:- 🌛🌛🌛

  The labrador and I have since passed a happy five days in Weston super Mare which gave me opportunity to visit the legendary Papa’s for some truly fine cod and chips, lovely chunks of cod meat in a pleasingly light batter and some very passable chips to accompany it, and The Ginger Pig Kitchen where the crema Catalana is a triumphant model example of what Purnell’s Plates should be turning out (and the accompanying sable pig is a pleasure too).

  Chef Andrew Sheridan has announced the closure of About 8. Perhaps this is wise. It was always a very personal project, just as Black And Green is also. Alas he could not clone himself and therefore divided his time between cooking at About 8 at the weekend and at Black And Green during the week. About 8 was excellent but possibly too self-indulgent and it was hampering what was taking place in Craft which had been divided up by net curtains suggestive of a harem rather than a restaurant and where the food was not  really to the standard it had previously been.

  Now Craft is being converted into a brasserie and reincluding the space previously occupied by About 8. At the same time the dining pods in the ‘garden area’, which I always thought looked rather tacky, though they did help to see Craft through the COVID-19 lockdown crisis, have been removed. It seems Craft is going upmarket in image at the very least and hopefully the food served there will return to its previous heights in parallel with the look. About 8 is relocating to Liverpool from where Sheridan originated and it is not clear in Sheridan’s announcement whether he himself is planning to return there which would obviously, even if unintentionally, affect the personality of the food served at Black And Green. Sheridan is also planning to open a new restaurant, Severn and Wye, at Newent in Gloucestershire, south of Malvern as well as opening a gastropub in Newent.