Hibiscus

[Harters]

This is the third time we’ve eaten at Hibiscus (the second whilst it’s been in London) and, on each occasion, we’ve taken the “Taste of .....whatever season it was” menu – four courses, with the expected bells & whistles of canapés, amuse, pre-dessert, currently at £80.

It kicked off well with excellent cheese gougeres and crisp, rich balls of polenta, parmesan and olive. There was also really good granary bread.

The amuse, served in an eggshell, was mushroom veloute mixed with a little scrambled egg and coconut. The velouté part was very well made and perfectly seasoned. The egg wasn’t to my wife’s taste – but then she doesn’t really like egg.

The starter proper was served as a parmesan royale, which was light and delicate, topped with roasted nuts which gave a nice texture change and a hint of sweetness. Poured around it, at the table, velouté made a second appearance in a potato and toasted rice one – again a delicate flavour here. Looked lovely

Plaice was a star dish and, truth be told, there needed to be a star at this point in the meal. Perfectly cooked with still just a hint of translucence in the middle, it was topped with something crunchy, but I’m not sure what. Surrounded by some roasted salsify and mushrooms, which brought an earthiness and a tangy clementine sauce, we really enjoyed this.

The main course was shoulder of pork cooked “blanquette style”, although it seemed as though Bosi was almost playing with American BBQ food. Certainly it was long-cooked until extremely fork-cutting tender, similar to “pulled pork”. But there was none of the smokiness in the meat that you expect in the American south – but it appeared in the smoked mashed potato. This was the second time we’d had this in recent times and it really does work to lift a plate. Sticking to our perceived American theme, there was a scattering of sweetcorn and, also, tiny dice of something white (unfortunately, too small and too few for our palates to determine what they were).

Pre-dessert reflected Hibiscus’ interest in incorporating vegetables into desserts so a Granny Smith sorbet came accompanied by fine dice of celeriac and a cumin crisp. This was clever, introducing a slight savoury texture contrast, but not necessarily a great improvement on a simple sharp apple sorbet.

Dessert itself brought a disc of icecream, sorbet and a wedge of poached fruit (perhaps quince or medlar). Sweet, yet still light – a pleasant end to the meal. And finally, good coffee and petit fours.

We’d read reports that recent service had been cold and stand-offish, but there was none of that. Certainly, service is formal but staff smile, staff engage you, staff respond warmly. The newish sommelier is excellent – thoroughly knowledgable of his craft. We spent just shy of £250 – including aperitifs, a couple of glasses of wine, a couple of bottles of water and service. Every dish had worked in its own way. Everything had been nice (a fairly “middle of the road” word that seems to work here). Nothing had jarred and the courses had flowed well one to the other as an integrated menu. But I think when you’re eating Michelin 2*, and spending that sort of money, you might want and expect a “WOW factor” somewhere during the evening. Something that you’ll still be talking about weeks later. And there just wasn’t.

[david goodfellow]

John,

You don't sound too impressed. It needs to be special at those prices. I note you did not even have a bottle of wine in your bill.

Seems to me quite a few Michelin places are pricing themselves out of casual-ish type of dining, certainly at those prices, its special occasions only.

What gets me also is the 12.5% service charge, its near to £100 per person without even a drink. Do they impose one?

Which begs the question. Was it busy?

Bet you won't be doing it again for a while.

[Harters]

Well, yes, we were a bit disappointed. On the strength of our two previous visits, we'd have had no hesitation in saying this was our "best/favourite" restaurant in the country but I don't think we'd say that now. It had been nearly 3 years since we were last there. I see from my notes of that meal that there were a number of "wow" dishes - and that the cost of the "taste of.." menu was only £57.50. Well, I know there's been some inflation in that time, but the current price of £80 is a significant uplift.

I take your point about "special occasion" and , indeed, this was sort of one. It's what herself and I now call the "Office Christmas Party". When I took early retirement some years back, it was coming up to Christmas and Mrs H asked me if there was anything I was missing about work. Jokingly, I said the Party. She replied that I must have one then. Since then we've had an "outing" - I got to choose, she got to not object to my choice (although she's now retired as well, so it's a joint thing.

As for Hibiscus, every table had customers. A couple were obviously "business dinners" but most were couples like ourselves. So, maybe it's just us that are no longer appreciating Claude's style of cooking as much as we used to.

[david goodfellow]

Looking at the website I think you were lucky with that Autumn menu. The one listed on the site lists silver mullet and label anglaise chicken as the fish and meat courses, I ask you, both cheap (for this standard) products. No lobster or any luxury stuff is on there.

The tasting proper is £95 and two courses a la carte are £60, dear oh dear.

Seems the only wow may be the bill, according to your report.

[Pam Brunning]

Well you can't say I didn't warn you John!

We went for the cheap option our set lunch came to £100.

We were very disappointed - there was no wow factor as there used to be in Ludlow.

It is over priced for the very ordinary ingredients they use but I suppose that is the problem when opening a restaurant in one of the most expensives square miles in the world.

Edited December 10, 2010 by Pam Brunning (log)

[Man]

For the sake of variety I'll state a contrary opinion

I have just been there today for the 'cheap' lunch (53.50 for three courses plus water, glass of wine, petit four and coffee), almost exactly one year since my last visit, when I was wowed. And this time I was wowed again, more.

Must say I also enjoyed this lunch better than my recent dinner at the Ledbury (though I wouldn't judge the latter on the basis of a single experience.)

The skate (with jerusalem artichoke, vanilla puree and 'burnt sweetcorn') was for Woman the star of the show. And I agreed this was a classy, in a way perfect, dish: perfect cooking, perfect seasoning, perfect balance of (predominantly sweet) flavours. We chose this dish (£5 supplement) to have a straight contest with the skate we had at Ledbury, and well, you can guess who won.

But for me the star was the slow cooked hare. This wasn't perfect at all: slightly too dry for what sauce was available, and the drying also caused (in our opinion) an excessive concentration of salt (we are both very sensitive to salt): but the potent, deep gamey punch, the buttered cabbage and an absolutely ravishing side pie of shoulder, foie gras and spiced potatoes won the day for me. This dish confirmed that a brilliantly conceived dish survives even a less than perfect execution.

The meal had started very well, with an amuse of mushroom veloute' and coconut cream that combined the two main ingredients to stunning effect.

It concluded with very accomplished petit four (notable a smoked fudge) and an impeccable espresso, which for me is important.

And went through a dish of pheasant quenelles where details such as ever so small cubes of mango provided an eccentric but well judged background; a crab with pressed leeks, liquorice and pear in which reading the ingredients you can imagine either heaven or hell, but it was the former; and the Hibiscus chocolate tarte with basil ice cream which, combined with a star anise crispy bit, we found provocative and seductive.

In sum, great control of flavours, magic use of spices, imaginative contrasts and matchings: on the basis of our experience, this kitchen is firing on all cylinders. But yes, the prices have gone up: last year for the same type of meal we spent 10% less - I really think they are stretching it to the limit. Yet, the room was packed. What crisis?.

[phil_v]

I went to Hibiscus last August and it was certainly one of the most disappointing set lunches I've had in London.

Firstly, literally half of the items on the menu had surcharges, none of which were for particularly 'luxury' ingredients that you might expect for particular truffle / lobster dishes etc. Either offer a set lunch, or don't, doing half and half it just annoying.

Firstly, the amuse bouche was a cocktail of (from memory) some kind of watermelon and basil, with a pineapple foam on top. As a long time bartender and now a bar owner, this really was one of the worst cocktails I've tasted in a long time. Overly sweet with the balance of watermelon and pineapple, and the foam was sickly. Not great as a pre-dessert, let alone an amuse bouche.

Secondly, whilst I may be ordering the set lunch menu rather than the a la carte, I am still a paying customer in a restaurant and expect to be treated the same as everyone else. When the main courses were delivered to our table, the waiter didn't stop to say what they were. As a result, we were slightly confused as to what we had, which I then realised was because I'd been given the mutton cottage pie with feta from the set menu, and not the fish that I'd ordered. After trying to get someone's attention, a waiter came over, whereupon I explained what had happened. He looked at me, and I swear was about to argue that I had ordered that, but then just took my dish away without apology. So we sat there, with my girlfriend's food going cold, waiting for my main dish. I persuaded my girlfriend to start without me, and a little while later my dish arrived, still without an apology for it being incorrect, or seemingly any realistion that my girlfriend's food could have been taken back to the kitchen.

And when the food arrived, nothing really excited. The only dish that I really remember was the Fish (grey mullet) with peach and beetroot, which was a scattering of bits of peach and beetroot across the plate, with such a small drizzle of something as to be unnoticeable. Just small bits of food next to each other, which didn't work as a plate of food. My girlfriend's Chicken (surcharge £10 I seem to remember) was equally uninspiring.

I go to top restaurants expecting to pay more than average for better than average food and service. There have been many great reviews of Hibiscus, but perhaps these were for people dining a la carte rather than set lunches, although I can't believe that anybody would have appreciated the amuse-bouche. The food and service here were way below any other 'fine-dining' restaurants that I've eaten in. Very disappointing.

[Pam Brunning]

I wish you had posted this straight away Phil, it might have saved us throwing £100 away on lunch last September!

Anyone been to The Langham since the Roux's have been in charge of The Landau?

[felixhirsch]

Went twice now to Hibiscus, the last time in early Dec 2010, and must say that it was underwhelming each time. I simply can't see how it gets two stars? The service is now fine, the sommelier good, but the prices are far from reality. The wine list is in some cases twice as expensive as the Square's, the taste of a season menu is basically just the lunch menu without you having to choose etc...

We had a miserable mackerel with apple starter and a decent wood pigeon. Even for a set lunch, it seemed a bit dull. To serve two minuscule pieces of mackerel and around half a wood pigeon (even at Fortnum's they cost no more than £3) is not that great in a two star. But, if you do it properly why not, here however the starter was so sour that it was a horror to eat, whilst the main was fine, more or less 1* level I'd say.

Pity, but well, somehow it's much harder to spend £80 for a lunch here than the double at some other places.

[Man]

The wine list is in some cases twice as expensive as the Square's

Hi Felix, could you indicate a couple of wines that cost twice at Hibiscus compared to the Square?

[felixhirsch]

sorry, but I was there in December. Don't remember exactly. But some had mark-ups that make you drink the cheapest wine on the list, out of principle.

It's always sad to see, but well...