Browns hotel has the notable distinction of being the very first hotel in London. It was opened by the former servants of Lord Byron in 1837 and has been open ever since. Local legend also says Rudyard Kipling wrote The Jungle Book while sitting in the English Tea Room. With history like that, you know you’re in for a good time.
The hotel has changed hands a couple of times since opening, most recently to Rocco Forte. Since the purchase, the hotel has enjoyed a £24 million restoration, and is looking all the better for it. With the inclusion of Mark Hix and Lee Streeton to look after the food, what could go wrong?
We are always suspicious of people who are “Directors of food.” It sounds so pretentious, even for such a high class establishment. Yet we can’t fault Hix’s menu. It’s English, with both traditional dishes and modern fine dining delicacies.
Brown's Hotel is a quintessentially English building. The doormen wear top hats and livery, the carpet is plush, and there is an air of quiet elegance about the place. It doesn’t pretend to be anything, it just is.
The décor is a little imposing at first. Wood panelling, green suede chairs, white tablecloths and silk flowers. However, closer inspection sees the quality finish in everything around you and soon sets you at ease.
The dining room is long and rectangular with simple lighting and some “interesting” artwork on the walls. Above the fireplace at one end of the room is Tracey Emin’s neon pink “I Loved You, More Than I Can Love.” An odd choice for such a traditional backdrop.
The menu is great and celebrates English seasonal produce. Everything is sourced from our isles, the Fowey lobster, Cornish lemon sole, Orkney scallops, Yorkshire Dales cock pheasant and so on. It’s nice to see local ingredients being given such high praise as to end up on this menu.
Our entrees consisted of Dorset crab and artichoke soup. The crab was beautifully dressed and came with bittercress. It was the first time I had tried that particular garnish, and it set the crab off perfectly. The artichoke soup was great. It was rich, flavoursome and just lovely.
After that starter we were both looking forward to our main course. We chose fillet steak on the bone and sausage and mash, with sides of more mashed potato, creamed spinach and roasted parsnips.
The fillet steak was exactly as you would expect from a restaurant of this calibre. It was perfectly cooked, juicy, pink in the middle, and begged to be eaten. It almost glowed in its meaty glory on the plate.
Considering where we were, it wasn’t any old sausage and mash. This was Brown’s special pork sausages with mashed potato and onion gravy. Those sausages were utterly delicious. It’s only when you eat sausages like these that you really appreciate good produce as opposed to the stuff you buy at supermarkets. They had a rich, clean taste that just pleaded with you to take the next mouthful.
We had a rose with our meal, a Chateau la Gordonne. This light, fruity wine set off the red meat perfectly. We would have had more than one bottle, but we had a deadline to meet.
Hix at the Albemarle Restaurant, Browns Hotel, Mayfair is as much a mouthful to say as it is to dine there. Despite the pretentious self-promotion, the menu is brilliant. It celebrates our little island, and makes the most of what we produce. Everything was perfectly cooked, and the entire experience will be repeated at the first opportunity.
The Bill: £67 per head
