A grind at Covent Garden’s new Italian
RESTAURANT OF THE WEEK MARGOT
IREACH for the pepper mill to season a first course of vitello tonnato. I turn and turn but in vain. A waiter bounces up to take over. No pepper is sprinkling the slices of veal. “Maybe it’s empty of peppercorns,” I venture. A second waiter offers a replacement pepper mill. Turn, turn, just the odd little speck is coming out. “Tell me when to stop,” says the valiant first waiter. “In about a year,” murmurs my companion. The waiter withdraws. There is an unspoken understanding that the dish may well not need black pepper. The mills may be pretty with their silver trim but the mechanism doesn’t deliver.
The Italian re st aurant Margot , recently opened in Covent Garden, is the venture of Paulo de Tarso and Nicolas Jaouën, faces that are possibly known to customers of Bar Boulud and La Petite Maison where, respectively, the two chaps have recently been restaurant managers — or maybe from Scott’s, where they worked the floor together.
Maurizio Morelli, who made his mark at Latium in Berners Street and then opened the more casual Briciole, also in W1, has been appointed executive chef. This is an establishment led by front-of-house, a throwback you might say to the old days when customers were more likely to greet the maître’d delightedly by name than know or much mind who was chef. It still obtains in places. Think of the sainted Jesus Adorno at Le Caprice.
The two-floor site that was previously Moti Mahal has been stylishly transformed by architectural designers Fabled Studio, also responsible for Restaurant Gordon Ramsay and Dinner by Heston Blumenthal. The invest- ment in structure, finishes, details — marble, copper, deep-blue buttonbacked leather banquettes — is obviously hefty. Little copper saucepans, silver jugs, glass teapots and fancy tableware — although there are no marrow spoons when marrow spoons are needed — and snowy white cloths (hurrah) all add to the outlay.
There are more waiting staff than you can shake a stick at, dressed in as many hierarchical outfits as a regiment in the Ruritanian army. Even at lunchtime when white tablecloths are whipped away, our waiter is attired in dinner jacket and bow tie.
The long, arguably overlong, menu kicks off with plates, small (apparently very small, according to a chum who tries one) and large, of Italian salumi and cheeses suited to a quick visit with a drink at the bar where comfortable seats invite such an option. In for dinner, we skip over that page and pick from crudi, antipasti and insalate. What a cunning idea to flavour tuna tartare with grey mullet bottarga, I think, but I can find no evidence of the dried roe, not even saltiness. Thin skeins of candied orange on top do make their presence felt. Herby sprigs are another garnish, which we will discover the kitchen can seldom resist.
Cornish crab salad with avocado has the vegetable (fruit, actually) reduced to a smear, which disappoints. Salads, one headlined Rucola e Parmigianog including Heritage ge tomatoes, anotherer Fagiolini, are burried in heaps of the he harsh l e a v e ss .
“Clearly they got ot
Hunan-style cucumbers (pictured), a cooling, cool butt hot side dish at the second Chickk ’n’ Sours near Cambridge Circus. Loved it all, including the chipper staff.
Itamar Srulovich, with his wife Sarit Packer, seem unstoppable which, around where I live, is great a good price on the arugula,” says one of my guests.
More rocket and flossy (that’s the way with Heritage) tomatoes accompany a main course of grilled chicken breast ordered by she who had the rucola salad. A really on-it waiter would have pointed this out when taking the order. Looking at it, someone at the table crisply says “Côte”. I think that is doing Côte a disservice. At one of those restaurants the £17.50 charge here could pay for a complete meal. And when they chargrill half a Breton chicken, chips are thrown in.
I choose a dish of the day of veal chop with black cabbage, described by the waiter as costing £32. A diminutive, rather flaccid chop is not the mighty plate-dominating beast it should be and on the bill I notice the charge is £34. Cavolo nero is sopping wet. Ossobuco, one slice of the veal bone, is served with overcooked but saffronsunnyy risotto alla Milanese. The presence of marrow in the bone is duly signalled by thet waiter but the teaspoon provided can’t
A lunch special of beautifully cooked whole Dover sole with brown shrimp beurre blanc for £20.50 at my sister’s Hampstead pub The Wells. get in. Some gremolata would be nice.
Spotting a fine-looking pasta dish being served at the next table encourages me to return the next day at lunchtime to try pasta. A pliable pal agrees to start with a dish of the day of veal tortellini followed by tagliolini with Sicilian red prawns, artichokes and cherry tomatoes (the assembly I had spotted). Chef Morelli is known for his pasta skills and both dishes are delicious, the tagliolini perhaps benefiting from a little less cooking time, but the tortellini owing quite a lot to generously grated black truffles.
A funny little salad of green beans, carrots and frizzy lettuce detracts from the nobility of vitello tonnato, presented for some reason with the sauce beneath the slices of meat. Such froufrou touches can spell a lack of confidence. Italian food is — and should be — starkly served.
Best of the desserts tried at the two meals are affogato al caramello, where the sweet mousse jousts skilfully with espresso and baba al rum — eaten greedily. Sommeliers who have been seen at Coya and Chiltern Firehouse have put together a sound wine list but, as with the prices for food, there is misplaced confidence. The chap running the catering at the Royal Opera House who joins us for dinner muses that new restaurants usually concentrate on customer turnover while getting established rather than attempting straight away to bolster the GP (gross profit) …Screwing that peppermill with no useful outcome becomes almost parabolic.
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