GO WESTERN, OLD BOY
The Western Club restaurant in Glasgow is a new take on a very old institution
Glasgow’s Western Club is an updated version of an old institution
Back in the day, long before she first broke bread with Yours Truly, Mrs Mystery Diner was an occasional visitor at the Western Club in Glasgow, where her father was a member. If they were waiting for trains to far-flung places (Edinburgh, for example) from nearby Queen Street station, or if she was about to undergo a particularly painful procedure at her dentist in Somerset Place, the pill would often be sweetened with a bite to eat at this most traditional of city centre clubs.
Fast forward three decades or so, and our return for dinner is the first time she has been to the Western Club since the Bay City Rollers disbanded. It is, to put it mildly, a bit of a culture shock. Where once everything used to be so achingly fusty and time-served, these days the main dining room at the almost 200-yearold club is a very different one to the beast my better half remembers from her youth.
For a start, although the top floor is out of bounds to all but members, for the first time the Western Club’s restaurant is now open to the hoi polloi, which includes us. Not only that, but it’s got unfeasibly lush carpets, padded banquettes and has been painted in a rather muted on-trend colour, which in the half-light I think looks faintly green but which I’m forcibly told is ‘putty’ grey. Either way, it’s certainly a far cry from the usual gaudy plumage in which such grand old Victorian institutions are usually bedecked.
The decor of this first-floor salon overlooking Royal Exchange Square is conspicuously contemporary and is t he work of designer Amanda Rosa, who was in turn commissioned by the Glasgow restaurateur Alan Tomkins, who runs the restaurant and also counts the Blue Dog cocktail bar, Vronis and Urban Bar & Brasserie amongst his ventures.
If the surroundings are bang up-to-date, so is the menu. The old staples of club life from back in the day – the potted shrimp and steak and kidney pudding – have been replaced by the sort of contemporary Scottish cuisine with an international twist, much as you’ll find across the square at 29 and in other high-quality dining rooms at Blythswood Square or One Devonshire Gardens.
After some surprisingly ordinary amuses bouches that included haggis balls, our starters were a mixed bunch, with a nicely al dente cauliflower risotto on one hand, and a horribly bland and dry ‘cannon of finely spiced duck’ on the other. The trio of lamb with bubble and squeak plus glazed roots was competently done, as was the roast venison saddle with sweet and sour cabbage and crispy potato cake, but the portion size of both dishes was verging on the parsimonious while the prices – £25.50 for three small slices of vension – wasn’t.
Thankfully, the pudding course witnessed something of a resurgence for the kitchen. In particular, the lemon posset topped with a raspberry sauce had a lovely acidic edge that was perfectly judged. The dark chocolate tart with puff candy, vanilla and orange was a bit on the heavy side, but generally enjoyable too.
If the food was decent without being memorable (sadly the bill was memorable for being mildly indecent), there are several other reasons to eat at the Western Club restaurant. For a start, there’s an undeniable thrill to gawping at the throng of Glasgow’s finest going about their business in such a prestigious environment, and the place has a corps of waiting staff who are fantastically attentive and keen to be of service, although there is definitely a limit to how many times it’s advisable to ask your guests how much they’re enjoying the food.
The wine list is pretty succinct but interesting too, although with a price of £22 for the bottom of the range option, it’s not exactly for the fainthearted.
So I’d say go along, enjoy yourself and soak up the undeniable sense of reflected grandeur that this grand old dining room still exudes. As for Mrs MD, she was just happy that for once she didn’t spend the whole of her meal thinking about the drill her dentist would soon be wielding at her, or the trip to the Dark Side, as her mob always called Edinburgh.