I need help finding a restaurant

[Raj Banerjee]

I need to book a private dining room for up to 40 people in London (preferably somewhere in the West End/Mayfair area). The food has to be good, of course, but more than that I need to have a menu with at least (as a minimum) 3 dishes per course for 3 courses.

The room has to be completely private, the service and wine list have to be decent at the least.

Price per person could be anything up to £60.

Anyone got any ideas or recommendations????

[ravelda]

Mews of mayfair have a pretty big room and at £60 per head you should be well over their minimum charge. Nobu also has pretty good capacity in their private room. I think Petrus has a decent sized on but not 100% sure

Hope this is of some help.

Best,

David

[PoppySeedBagel]

I don't know if the private rooms would be big enough, but try Bertorelli's in Charlotte Street. They did a surprisingly good meal for 26 of us the other night. There was choice of menus - even a cut-down a la carte is available. They coped with vegetarian, muslim, and kosher requirements pretty well.

[Jon Tseng]

If your £60 is all inclusive there's little chance of swinging a reasonable deal at an upmarket joint (Petrus, Nobu, Gordon Ramsayalikes).

In that price range think about one of the better Asian/Chinese places in town. They tend to have lots of private rooms (weddings etc) and that style of shared food is maybe better for bigger parties anyhow.

Haven't a clue about restaurants though. Best thing would be to get the Time Out London, flick to the map at the back and start looking - all restaurants are marked on the map - damn useful when you're trying to find somewhere someplace.

J

[ravelda]

Good point Jon, Chinese places are the most likely to have that much space. Try looking at www.squaremeal.co.uk Raj, you can search there by restaurants that do private rooms for groups and the site also tells you how many they can accomodate.

[Raj Banerjee]

Thanks for the responses thus far.

I should clarify a couple of details for you;

It is £60 per head for food, and a seperate budget for wine/alcohol, which will be roughly £60-80 per head.

I probably should mention that this is a corporate event, and the main partner is very fussy and is more accustomed to michelin-starred food and service.

I know that when organising a dinner for so many people you're bound to make a couple of them unhappy with your choice.

The main problem I have found so far calling up restaurants, and it is a most understandable problem, is accommodating 3 dish choices per course. All seem to want just one dish per course, but this along with the room being private are the only criteria I am unwilling to negotiate on.

Is finding a place in time for next friday a pipe dream?

[ravelda]

Not at all Raj, we have had events at a number of places including Nobu, Sketch and Petrus using their private rooms (not sure how many Petrus took though) and were offered extremly good menus. I would give them a try and if no luck look on the website I mentioned

[nikkib]

Try The Savoy Grill, Their Private room seats around 50 and would be within your price range.

[Soapy Joe]

For thse sort of budget you have why not take over a small restaurant for the night? I would recommend Konstam at the Albert if you want to impress and suprise people with a place that has great food and a location that most people will assume is not going to produce fantastic food. For your budget you will have much more fun having somewhere entirely to yourselves.

[Raj Banerjee]

Thank you all so very much for your timely and astute recommendations.

Organisation is in the process, I am away in Holland for a couple of days now.

It seems like an almost thankless task, but I have put forward my suggestions and we'll see what happens!

Thanks again folks, much appreciated.

Raj