Three top London restaurants, including a bling, bling a bling bling Vintage Champagne list

Thinking about your next plate of food may be the last thing on your mind right now.  But, as and when, you get back in the saddle, here’s a trio of great London restaurants for you to check out.  Personally “vetted” by me this last fortnight, all three also made the cut for Fay Maschler’s Evening Standard Restaurants of the Year 2011.

Galoupet

Connected to Chateâu du Galoupet in Provence, unsurprisingly the focus at this Knightsbridge vinoteca is on wine or, more accurately, food and wine matching.  When the quarterly seasonal menu of sharing plates changes, so does Galoupet’s small but perfectly formed and refreshingly unobvious wine list.

What’s more, all 36 wines are available by the glass (via the Enomatic® system) and can be purchased retail. And that includes rare gems like Ridge, York Creek 1998, Ridge, Santa Cruz Mountains 1998, Ridge, Geyserville 1998, Ridge and Monte Bello 1998.

Former food blogger Operations Director Shaan Mahrotri (pictured), who is related to Chateau du Galoupet’s owners, is the creative force behind the restaurant.  I first met him in 2009 at a tasting and it was fun to see his vision go from paper to place – Beauchamp Place at that!

The aim is, of course, to please.  But just as importantly, his small plates and wines by the glass concept encourages you to be playful and experiment, as do the wine recommendations (two with each dish).  Take Bonarda Vivace il Bosco, Oltrèpo Pavese (a sparkling red) with Burrata, beetroot, chilli.

I caught up with Mahrotri over small bites of crab and baby cucumber (pictured).  This was followed by a generous and super succulent salad of smoked eel and Jerusalem artichoke with horseradish dressing, brilliantly paired with Chateau Galoupet’s top Côtes de Provence.  The savoury, subtly textured, mineral and dry Tibur rosé 2009 is a blend of 80% Tibouren, 20% Rolle – very good indeed.

Though Mahrotri made sure I tasted the family silver (Chateau Galoupet’s new sparkling rosé, L’Exception), as well as the golden Tibur, the eye popping retail Champagne list (see here) is pure platinum.   If you’re in the market for 1921 Pol Roger (£3690), 1926 Perrier Jouet (£1360) or 1937 Alfred Gratien bottle (£510) you know where to look.  And £300 for a bottle of 1993 Louis Roederer Cristal or £200 for 1995 Dom Pérignon strikes me as pretty reasonable in the scheme of things.  Only a shame that The Flute (London’s first Enomatic® machine for Champagne), was out of action!

Pollen Street Social

Jason Atherton’s restaurant and tapas bar just off Oxford Street/Regent Street offers a great set lunch menu (£22 for two courses, £25.50 for three) – perfect for our Christmas Eve pre-theatre early lunch (Noises Off – very funny).

Pollen Street Social’s dishes are beautifully constructed and presented and generously proportioned.  No stinting with cheap cuts or portions here with my coupe of crab and avocado, followed by cod on a bed of seaweed potatoes with razor clams and particularly divine pistachio financier and icecream.

The choice of wines by the glass is excellent too – Bolly rosé followed by Ch. de Puligny-Montrachet Bourgogne Blanc Le Clos du Chateau 2009 for me.

Medlar

I’d already visited Medlar in the summer for a wine tasting with Torbreck’s Dave Powell (fabulous, reported here).  Just south of Bluebird on the Kings Road, Chelsea, the affable staff warmly greet and seat you.  And, given it lured me back with my parents on New Year’s Eve, you can imagine just how much I’d enjoyed the food first time around.

In fact the menu hadn’t changed, about which I had mixed feelings.  Good because I knew what to recommend, also because I’d been thinking about the starter of crab ravioli with samphire, brown shrimp, fondue of leeks and bisque sauce since the summer!  While Torbreck Roussanne Marsanne Viognier 2009 brought out the sweetness of the dish, Gerard Boulay Sancerre 2010 put the emphasis on its mineral, salty twang.  Both great matches.

Mum and dad loved it too, also their main of under blade fillet with bone marrow, salad, triple cooked chips and béarnaise.  Having double-ravioli-ed last time (squash with chanterelles), this time I opted for guilt head bream with risotto nero and shaved fennel salad.  A citrus infused gremolata made for great balance and lift.  Prune and armagnac ice cream with financiers finished three of us off (deliciously so though), while  mum went for the more sensible mandarin sorbet, which she pronounced exquisite.

Click here for Maschler’s top twelve.