CIGALA

[Simon Majumdar]

I had a very enjoyable Sunday lunch yesterday at what is rapidly becoming one of my favourite places in town.

Cigala, just in case you don't know it, is the sister restaurant to the estimable Moro on Exmouth market and it carries off the same iberian schtick with equal aplomb and certainly with much more success than the disappointing Eyre bros.

They had a set lunch thing going on and offered two courses for £12.50, three for £15 which for London is exceptionally good.

Two starters of beetroot, orange and arugala salad were pleasant if not any better than a salad has any right to be.  mains of a dorada and Meatballs were up to the usual standard I have experienced here on about four other occasions.

The wine list is eccentric and confusing but a superb valure ribero at £15 was a highlight as were two glasses of Manzanilla.  A glass of Carlos Primera was proffered on the house and it would have been rude to turn down a glass of Spain's finest.

At £60 for two, this offers one of the bargains of London.  The room is light and airy and the service is efficient and friendly.  It was also nice to see so many families there all with well behaved little treasures.

If you have not tried this place, I can recommend it.

[Andy Lynes]

I happened to pass Cigala the other night as I rather drunkenly tried to find my way back to my hotel from the deadly dull Richard Corrigan at....The Lindsay house (those dots say it all really). Looked rather interesting, though I didn't like the stone cladding very much. Will definately give it a go soon.

[Andy Lynes]

Well, due to some unusual work circumstances, I ended up in Cigala on Monday night. The place was absolutely rammed at 8.00pm when I arrived, I got the last but one table, the last filled about 20mins later.

I don't like the restaurant room, it's way too noisey for my tastes, with the open kitchen adding to the overall heat and sound levels. They are obviously running on a tight budget, with just about enough front of house staff to manage the busy room. This meant that they were rushing around all night adding a rather frantic edge to the atmosphere.

I started with a dry and rather tastless coarse country style rabbit pate, followed by a large red bream ala plancha (grilled on the bone), a compote type thing of marinated veg, peppers and aubergine mostly, and a side order of patatas bravas which turned out to be a works canteen style portion of deep fried potato cubes with some tomato and herb sauce on top.

This weas nice enough, but I did get bored of eating it after a while, as I had the pate.  

I had a glass of beer and a white rioja and the bill was £33.00. I won't go back as it's not really my thing at all. I think I ordered badly, but the menu is short and duff items should not really be present. They sold an awful lot of bream whilst I was there so I was not alone in anticipating that it would be good, which in fact it was, but just not that interesting.

If you like uncomplicated Spanish style food in lively surroundings and are a fan of Spanish wines and sherries, I would guess that there is no better place in London to enjoy them.  

[Simon Majumdar]

Andy

It seems you had a bum night.  You are 100% right that on a short menu there should be no room for duff items.  Perhaps you ordered badly, but in truth you shouldn't have been able to.

I tend to go on a Sunday lunchtime when there are less people and it is all a bit less harried.  I have always found the service good and the food better

Still, there are so many places in town, you never have to go back to anywhere which does not impress first time

S

[Adam Lawrence]

In town Saturday, going to the British Museum, so off to Cigala for lunch beforehand. Will report back afterwards.

Now I think about it, I've been convinced (by the lady wife) to stick around and go to Private Lives at the Albery in the evening. Won't want a big meal after a decent lunch, but what would anyone suggest for a light bite somewhere around the West End before the theatre?

Ta

Adam

[Andy Lynes]

Adam, I would be very interested to know your opinion of Cigala, and private Lives as well as I am thinking of booking for it later in the year.

This may be over the top, but Incognico do a pre theatre dinner for 12.50 a head, and they are just down the road from the Albery in Shaftesbuty Avenue. Opposite is Mela which I told is very good, and further down is Conrad Gallagher, which does food in the bar.

[Adam Lawrence]

Well, had an excellent Saturday in town. Decided to take advantage of the shortage of guests in London hotels, 'cause the train back to Oxford at eleven didn't appeal, and got a very good deal (courtesy lastminute.com) at the Howard on the Embankment. Upgrade to junior suite made the deal even better. Mind you, however cheap the room, I always forget (because normally when I stay in posh hotels I'm on expenses) just how appallingly expensive the drinks are in such places. Sixteen quid for a vodka martini and a G&T! Did get good nibbles though, so not all bad. Nice hotel too.

Cigala: I loved it. Only a short menu available Saturday lunchtime, but fifteen quid for three courses (fiver supplement if you want the paella) is an absolute steal. Restaurant was quiet - only about four tables occupied, one slight service cock-up - another table's revueltos were brought to us (but it was sorted straight away). Stand-out dishes: textbook roast cod with lentils and a cucumber salad and (my order) roast chicken with salsa verde and braised spinach. Chicken was moist and succulent in a way that it so often isn't; simple but excellent. Starters were good - I had a crab gratin with an unpronouncable Basque name that was quite heavily loaded with chili; white bean and olive soup was OK, but not perhaps the most interesting dish ever. Could just be me though - I'm not a soup fanatic, and it was guzzled with pleasure.

Puds were a bit disappointing, a fairly nondescript creme caramel and a rice pudding that didn't really excite either.

Excellent manzanilla to open and a pleasant-ish bottle of albarino from Galicia to accompany (the lamb eater was on antibiotics which made things easier). Total cost including 12.5 per cent service - £105.

OK, this isn't fancy food and if your idea of a good time doesn't stretch beyond the starchy and Frenchy (Andy?) it mightn't appeal. But I love gutsy peasant-y cuisine and this was tip top. Excellent materials throughout.

Later that day was dragged kicking and screaming to the Albery for Private Lives. I am not normally a theatre type of guy, but Lucy is a Rickmaniac and it's her birthday next week. Packed full of middle-class middle-aged ladies carrying John Lewis' bags (there for Rickman I suspect).

Surprisingly, I had a great time. I felt Lindsay Duncan could perhaps have done with being a little more louche, but Rickman's air of the hangdog roue was just right, and the supporting cast played it well. Certainly more fun than being dragged to yet another musical.

[Andy Lynes]

Glad you enjoyed Cigala. Sounds like you made better choices than me and that the room was much less hectic. I can enjoy non-French, non-starchy restaurants - Mohsen kebab and The India Club being but 2 examples - but I do admit that it is my favourite and other types have to be exceptional for me to be impressed.

Cigala is school of River Cafe which is basicaly very good ingredients, not mucked about with very much, presentation not high on the list of priorities, served in casual surroundings in a casual way. I just have to be in the right mood for that sort of thing, whereas I am almost always in the mood for French food in glamorous surroundings with good service and great wine lists.

[Adam Lawrence]

I think much comes down to cost, and, as you said, mood. I like fancified Frenchified places a great deal too (my Best Meal Ever [tm] was at Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons) but there aren't too many places you'll get three courses of decent fancy cooking for fifteen quid. At their normal dinner prices, I think I'd still have regarded Cigala as good value, but it wouldn't have been an absolute steal. And I haven't been to the River Cafe, but I would need more than just pure and simple to justify their prices.

Plus it's down to what you're there for. We were meeting an old friend we hadn't seen for some months, so food, although important, wasn't the be-all and end-all of the experience. The fancier the cooking, the more I feel the need to concentrate on it, and that's perhaps not the ideal atmosphere for a social gathering.

[Andy Lynes]

Quote: from Adam Lawrence on 4:30 pm on Nov. 12, 2001

The fancier the cooking, the more I feel the need to concentrate on it.

This is a very good point, and the fact that I was dining alone meant that my attention was given wholly to the food and I may therefore have been hyper-critical.

You can have really great food in very casual places that reaches out and grabs you though. I would single out Mohsen kebab as a recent example where the surroundings and prices lead you to expect good grub, and in the main that is what you get.

However, things like the freshly baked flat bread with a basket of fresh herbs and radish, strained yoghurt with garlic and the braised lamb kebabs do stop you mid conversation with their flavours and aromas. Service is very good as well in a small and busy room.    

[Andy Lynes]

I've just got around to finishing my review for my website which I will be updating at the weekend, but here is a sneak preview for eGullet users. God, I'm good to you:

Cigala is a restaurant serving Spanish food and wines in Lambs Conduit Street, City of London. The chef and owners are ex Moro and River Cafe which has attracted a fair amount of media interest to the enterprise. As a consequence, the rather cramped room was packed to the rafters on a Monday night in late Winter 2001 when I paid them a visit.

I was seated in the rear of the dining room next to the open kitchen,  from which I was afforded a good view of the overworked front of house staff rushing back and forth in a valiant attempt to get the food to the customers in something like a timely manner. They did quite well under the circumstances, but I couldn't help but fell that one extra body would not have gone a miss. It may have been down to staff off sick or something of the sort, but the meagre number of waiters and waitresses gave the atmosphere in the room a rather frantic edge which I found less than enjoyable.  

I chose, badly as it turned out, coarse rabbit terrine with cornichons to start and red bream al a plancha (grilled) with marinated peppers and aubergine. The terrine was dry and flavourless, but at least there was lots of it as the old joke goes. Eating it was like working your way through a tin of corned beef, except less enjoyable.

The main course was again a large portion, this time a whole fish on the bone. I disagree with the received wisdom that fish is better cooked on the bone. Apart from a thick tranche of turbot cut through the body and roasted that I had at Adlards in Norwich a good few years ago, I have never had one that wasn't over cooked.

It is far easier to judge the doneness of fish when it is filleted and pan fried. You have to be exact to within a few seconds, use your eyes and ears and fingers to pinpoint the moment when the proteins set, or whatever it is that happens when the flesh turns from raw to perfectly cooked. This is simply not possible with a whole grilled or baked fish and it is so easy to go too far.

The diner then of course has to deal with the carcass on the plate, which is a #### site more messy and time consuming than it would be for the chef to liberate the fillet prior to cooking. Its all a bit of a fag, and in addition, you must avoid looking into those blind eyes which nevertheless seem to stare accusingly up at you.

So why did I order it in the first place I hear you ask, slamming down your cup of tea and tuting in a loud and deliberately attention grabbing manner. I can hear you call to your significant other or work colleague "This bloke right, he goes to a fancy restaurant, orders grilled fish right , then moans when it comes whole! Can you believe it. These people don't know they're born" (for the purposes of this review, I have assumed you are a taxi driver from the East End in order to accentuate the comic effect). Well, all I can say is I didn't realise it was going to be on the bone and I never thought to ask. So there.

Anyway, there was too much of it, I got bored eating it (a recurring theme for the night), the vegetables were of minimal interest, and the side dish of spiced "sauteed" potatoes, properly called "patata bravas" I ordered were hauntingly reminiscent, in their cubed and deep fried ordinariness, of a hundred works canteen meals.

I skipped dessert in case they turned out to be as unexceptional as they read and I moved from being  uninterested to bloody annoyed.  

I drank a glass of beer and one of white Rioja from the frankly perplexing wine list. As a lone diner, trying to make head or tale of it provided some much needed entertainment in the protracted gaps that divided the waitresses visits to my table.

Some people I know love Cigala and think it one of the best things to happen to London since the Thames barrier. I simply cannot agree. It is not actively bad. Had I not ordered quite so poorly and   were there to have been more front of house staff on duty,  I may have thought more highly of it. But it was a short menu, and duff items aren't really allowed on those (lets be fair here, the fish wasn't actually duff, I just didn't like it) and a thriving business should really be prepared to shell out for sufficient people to provide a decent level of service.

This review is based on just the one visit. Another night, another menu, another member of staff? Who knows,  it could have made all the difference. But if you are a fan of Spanish food and wine, and you like busy, noisy restaurants, if you are in fact an East End taxi driver, then Cigala could be just the place for you.  You couldn't just drop me a Foliage on your way could you?      

[macrosan]

Quote: from Andy Lynes on 6:21 pm on Jan. 17, 2002

As a lone diner, trying to make head or tale of it

Speeling, Andy, speeling :( "Head or TAIL" pleez.

You should have just enough time to correct it before you put it on your website, thus avoiding eternal Majumdarian humiliation. God, I'm good to you

My view is that you can't "select poorly" at a top quality restaurant. I agree that you can be adventurous and find you don't really like what you've chosen, but I think you know when you've done that and wouldn't slate the cooking as a result.