GRIDIRON, LONDON W1

This new hotel restaurant is a collab between Richard H Turner (Hawksmoor’s exec chef) and Colin McSherry (previously of Nuala).

The food is the stuff of death-row dining dreams. There are snacks and starters – the likes of crispy fried scampi with jalapeño tartare (good) and creamy white crab meat on crunchy toast with a slick of grassy lovage oil and a translucent lardo blanket (better). But, if you must, save room for the mains and as many sides as you dare. (Although note, there’s little for veggies and diddly for vegans.)

Highland sirloin comes served medium-rare, on the bone and with a just-right kiss of smoke. It’s joined on the menu by Middle White pork, Barnsley hogget and venison saddle, but we’re sidetracked by roasted turbot – sticky, gelatinous and bobbing in a roasted chicken butter sauce.

Beef-dripping galette potatoes are as golden and crisp as you could hope. Mashed potato, heavy with Tunworth cheese, comes topped with sticky braised pig’s trotter and its gravy, and spiked with crispy crackling.

Desserts are familiarly classic (and rib-sticking) – think English honey tart with clotted cream. Max and Noel Venning of Dalston’s Three Sheets are behind the cocktails, and wine writer Fiona Beckett all over le vin. Order a clear white russian with smooth vodka, coffee made mellow by miso, and clarified milk to start, and end with a salty syrah (Aléofane Crozes Hermitage 2017) with a lick of liquorice with the steak. gridironlondon.com