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We went on a quiet sunday evening and the food was excellent, but the experience let down by the service and ambiance
London,
Fay Maschler's rating
Reader rating
Description:
Phone: 020 7730 8135
Open: Open daily 9am-11.30pm. Main menu served from 11.30am-9pm last orders (currently).
Gastronomic art: Gallery Mess’ head chef David Swann
Mess is not the bonniest name for a café and restaurant attached to the Saatchi Gallery but presumably it occupies the space where the Grand Old Duke of York’s 10,000 men, when not marching up to the top of the hill and marching down again, once filled their bellies.
The design, as befits a canteen that services visitors to the 70,000 sq ft and four floors of white cubes and rectangles that make up one of contemporary art’s most important cheerleaders, is lean and clean and — maybe partly because I visited (inadvertently) on the first evening of trading — pristine. A wall of drinks is the first welcome sight.
Paintings and sculptures, a cheeky one in neon, beckon you towards a seating area beside glazed walls inside brick arches with views onto the green. Behind a half-height wall is another dining room where on the first visit we sat across from a seven-foot high black laced-up shoe. The art is selected from the wholly admirable Saatchi Online Artist’s Gallery, where all works are for sale with no commission charged either to artist or collector.
In the bad old days, when you called in caterers you could expect bridge rolls filled with mayonnaise (actually, that sounds so good) and perhaps cubes of cheddar and tinned pineapple threaded onto cocktail sticks and stuck into a half grapefruit. Now, events and parties are often underpinned by edible works of art. One of the leaders in this field is “rhubarb” food design (their style), the operator behind Gallery Mess.
For public catering of a certain kind, a company like this is increasingly seen as the solution. A few weeks ago I reviewed the new restaurant at the Whitechapel Gallery run by Vacherin, another expert in bespoke catering, which had the good sense/fortune to hire Maria Elia as head chef.
No chef is overtly credited with the Mess but the enthusiastic staff, some of them young women of a height and mien that would have got them straight into The Bluebell Girls (still high-kicking at the Paris Lido), seemed like the pick of a bunch, the supplest fish from a pool, and that is the strength of a catering company when set against an independent restaurateur.
Our French waiter, who poured water as if it were wine and seemed perfectly capable of the transformation if required, told us he trained for five years at hotel school in Paris. He enthused about the gazpacho on the list of specials and Reg, who ordered it, said it was one of the best he had ever tasted.
Croutons and chopped salad vegetables kept their crunch right up to and beyond the moment when a garnet-coloured chilled purée with a burr of chilli and a slick of olive oil was poured at the table from a container fashioned in ceramic to look like a Tetrapak carton. Mrs Charles Saatchi (Nigella Lawson), who on our second visit was dining with her son, told me that she has some of those at home. She also said that she had asked to try and, to the astonishment of the staff, had tried, the entire menu.
My first course was avocado and fennel salad with beetroot, organic seeds (majoring on pine kernels), pink grapefruit and honey dressing. It was judiciously balanced, extremely good.
Cumberland sausage with slow-cooked Puy lentils was, I thought, a bit too feisty, for which you can read salty, but on the second dinner when served with salad it seemed a tamer beast.
Sea bream with salade Niçoise elicited the comment “I would eat here every night if I lived nearby” and char-grilled Freeman’s Farm chicken with a mustardy sauce and watercress salad delivered more flavour than most chickens can muster. Only the chips, served in a wire net, were disappointing.
As far as I know there is no definitive recipe for knickerbocker glory. Here layers of crème brûlée were interleaved with berries and ice cream. Milk chocolate popcorn sundae featured a rich mousse topped with caramel popcorn and a sorbet also allegedly made from popcorn. If you look to dessert for rushes of sugar, what’s not to like?
When something that is usually done rather miserably is done extremely well, rejoicing breaks out. It also accounts for the star rating. Fortunately, the soft opening period, during which there is a 25 per cent discount on all menu items, lasts until 28 May.
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
Thank you Standard for an excellent tip.This is a charming new favourite of mine already!
- Fran, London
Excellent food,nice room,down to earth prices,pleasant and helpful staff,lovely views - love this place so thanks to Ms Mashler for spotting it.
- Gene Jacks, london
Very nice new treat for London.Beautiful setting ,but sadly Saatchi Gallery closed today,but lots of good art on display in the restaurant.Food excellent and not expensive
- Polly Franz, paris
love this place! Great food,great view ovelooking the lawns of Duke of york Sq,nice helpful staff,not too pricey either.Recommend the outside tables for a sunny lunch,or nice inside rooms for a drink and snack after work.
- Harry Webb, london
