Dinner - Lunch.

I may just be the luckiest person in the whole world and I mean the whole world. Not only, was I lucky enough to go to dinner at Dinner at the start of March. I was even luckier to return, for lunch at the end of March.



Knowing how good the food was, I decided to forgo breakfast in order to make sure I could fully appreciate the experience.











By 1.30pm, I was starving which normally makes me act like a crack addict gone cold turkey and happy to bite anyone and everyone's head off. Fortunately for everyone involved, the staff didn't give me any reason too. They were all chatty, charming and extremely friendly.


The dining room is sleek. The tables are spaced strangely far apart, which is quite a nice change. Like every other restaurant in London, they've decided to go table cloth-less. Like every other in restaurant in London, they don't have the table quality to be able to do that. No table cloths means you must have tables that will not scratch or chip. Only three months and the table was visibely scratched. Not enough to offend the average person but this is my pet peeve.

I started with The Meat Fruit. Its beautiful isn't it? Without knowledge that it wasn't a Mandarin,  it would have taken me a while to work it out. It was so pretty I didn't want to cut into i but cut into it I did. Inside was a lovely chicken liver parfait smooth and creamy accented with a goregeous mandarin jelly. Being penickity, as perfect as the Meat Fruit itself was, the bread that accompanied it was too greasy and too crisp. The Bread to Meat Fruit ratio was off so I ended up having to use the other bread, which I think worked better.

Now, maybe its just me but the menu at Dinner I find a little off putting. The names don't make me want to eat any of it. "Rice and Flesh" screams horror film rather than "yum" to me. Anyway, The Boyfriend, the more adventuorous of the two of us, braved the Rice and Flesh and I am glad he did. It was basically a saffron infused risotto with four little pieces of calves tail pooling away in what I imagine was their own cooking juices.

For the main course, already a little full, I went for the Spiced Pigeon. I didn't love it. Perhaps its because I forgot that I dont actually love pigeon , or artichoke for that matter. (Damn going Cold Turkey, clearly messing with my mental capacity).It was well cooked though, and the lavours complemented each other well.

The Boyfriend's Turbot with Cockle Ketchup,  he considered the to be well-cooked, tender and fresh, and the ketchup really brought out the qualities of the fish. The whole dish was rather light.

 Triple cook chips accompanied these which were perfectly salty and crisp.  Overall, I think the starters outshone the main courses. That was until we tried dessert.

So maybe it was the overwhelming appreciation I was feeling at being at Dinner again or maybe the starving for two hours was having an effect on my emotional state, but as I bit in to my Tipsy Cake I felt like crying, tears started to well up and The Boyfriend started to look panicked and pushing wine towards me. The knowledge that I would have to wait a minimum of three months to try that dessert again was agony. I genuinly think, its one of the best desserts I've ever eaten. The cake itself had an almost bread like consistency, soaked in some sort of custard. Now I've never eaten Tipsy Cake before, so I dont have a point of comparison, maybe this is what all Tipsy Cakes taste like, but I doubt it. Either way I am converted, and taking a trip to Texas in the next three months. It was served with roasted pinapples that provided a perfect sour contrast to the cake. It was the best use of ten pounds ever.

The Boyfriend thought his Taffety Tart was good, which it was but after trying mine (the ultimate sign I am a good person I actually gave him a bite), he conceeded that the Tipsy Cake was better.

We finished with an Earl Grey Ganache with a Carraway Biscuit which can only be described as a perfect cup of tea in icing form. If I could only start every day with one of these for breakfast.

Lunch at Dinner had one downside, I realized my future career of presenting, Man vs Food, was a lost cause. Being so full that I almost fell into a food coma and had to be rolled down the steps of the Mandarin Oriental, I knew I could never  take the place of Adam Richman as I once hoped. It was all worth it though.

The Bill came to around £200, which included a bottle of wine for around £80, and a £15 pot of tea (The Boyfriend's expensive taste - not mine).