The Five Fields

I've previously reviewed this restaurant and back then gave it 5 stars, it was well deserved and a hidden gem. Since then I've been back a few times, so I thought I knew what to expect.

But our visit last Friday night proved to be a completely different experience.
Not the food, that's still pretty good. However, on this occasion, the evening was ruined to some degree by the petulant argumentative 'welcome' from someone who really should consider whether the hospitality industry really is for him.

Having given him my name, he insisted I hadn't booked a table. He then went on to ask, was it under another name? No, it wasn't. Unable to find my booking he then told me, I had booked it for the previous night but that had been cancelled. I said, no I had booked it for the Friday. Then like a petulant child, he once again repeated I had not booked.... and then followed it up with....but it's okay as we have a table.

WTF!

If I hadn't eaten there before and known what to expect from the food and were not with my wife and son, I would have walked out.

I truly feel sorry for the rest of the staff, front and kitchen who work extremely hard to make this place work, only to be let down by one of their own.

Oh and guess what I found on my computer later that evening, the booking confirmation.

I've previously reviewed this restaurant and back then gave it 5 stars, it was well deserved and a hidden gem. Since then I've been back a few times, so I thought I knew what to expect.

But our visit last Friday night proved to be a completely different experience.
Not the food, that's still pretty good. However, on this occasion, the evening was ruined to some degree by the petulant argumentative 'welcome' from someone who really should consider whether the hospitality industry really is for him.

Having given him my name, he insisted I hadn't booked a table. He then went on to ask, was it under another name? No, it wasn't. Unable to find my booking he then told me, I had booked it for the previous night but that had been cancelled. I said, no I had booked it for the Friday. Then like a petulant child, he once again repeated I had not booked.... and then followed it up with....but it's okay as we have a table.

WTF!

If I hadn't eaten there before and known what to expect from the food and were not with my wife and son, I would have walked out.

I truly feel sorry for the rest of the staff, front and kitchen who work extremely hard to make this place work, only to be let down by one of their own.

Oh and guess what I found on my computer later that evening, the booking confirmation

I look forwards to your apology.

One look at the tasting menu and the choice was made. As is the norm these days there was a minimum of information about the ingredients and the style of preparation, but it was clear that nothing would not be to our taste. It was very comfortable in the good open dining room and for a change we were not assailed by piped music, the professional staff made us feel at home immediately, especially our excellent sommelière, and we were served not only very good canapés, cod mousse in a wafer tube and ham and piccalilli dumplings, but also an amuse-bouche of well-tempered cheese custard with salt-baked kohlrabi, carrot and soup - none of which formed part of the tasting menu, a traditional approach to the start of a meal which some other top restaurants could learn from. Now it was on to the eight-course tasting menu proper - a rhubarb cornet with braised asparagus and razor clam combined with Cornish scallop was followed by new season Wye valley asparagus in a bone marrow emulsion and oyster with an asparagus salad served in a wafer. Then the first in a sequence of supremely good offerings - freeze-dried raspberries with beetroot purée and a seaweed wafer backing up delicious foie gras and amazing smoked eel cubes that were absolutely out of this world with the purée. Quality continued at this high level on the next course in the form of brilliant crispy Cornish cod enhanced with garlic, brown butter and mussel sauce, mussels and roast cauliflower. Not content with this, the kitchen then assailed our palates with a terrific pairing of morels stuffed with duck offal, backed up with a super duck jus and broccoli. Herefordshire beef then put in an appearance, our short rib melting in the mouth, tasting just as it should and benefiting from a touch of luscious fat, some lightly cooked turnip crisp in red wine sauce and slightly salty nasturtium leaves making this dish one to savour and remember. The pre-dessert/palate cleanser, a caramel wafer with cucumber sorbet and pink grapefruit, worked perfectly and set us up nicely for the yummy chocolate, fruity gel and crunchy, honeycomb-like hazelnut biscuit. We were not prepared for Five Fields to be as good as this. We now have yet another delightful London addition to our list of restaurants to return to.