Raoul's
Café & Bar
Richard
Baker finds favour with this Notting
Hill Café Bar
Dinner at Raoul’s in Talbot Road demonstrated
how high quality cuisine has spread into
parts of London not so far associated
with eating out. Opened last Autumn as
an offshoot
of long-established Raoul’s in Maida Vale, the décor is a mixture of café styles
that have existed since the seventies, with background music mercifully discreet.
The manager, Sergey, was knowledgeable, and from an eclectic list of starters
a generous portion of fried calamari and king prawns was accompanied by a wasabi
mayonnaise infused with mustard, an unusual and appropriate combination of flavours.
The shredded salt cod salad contained pequillo peppers, spring onions and slivers
of cod that had been lightly salted by the chef and quite different from the
Portuguese variety that we had anticipated. Other items among the starters included
salads,
fried lamb’s kidneys and a Greek mezze.
Among the main courses were beef
and lamb steaks to suit most temperaments, a perfectly cooked fillet of sea
bass with a generous amount of saffron sauce, and a rabbit fricassée. The
meat was pink and had no appearance of being the wild variety (but was none
the worse for that). It was enhanced by a large helping of artichokes and
creamy sauce. Some steamed spinach - a bit pricey at £3.65 – tasted oddly
bland but a large bowl of fried slivers of courgettes more than made up for
it.
Not all the desserts are made
by the chef, but of those that were, we chose a chocolate mousse described
as ‘dark’ but with a cream content which had removed the immediacy of dark
chocolate but was nonetheless well made. The bread and butter pudding was
unusual and bore little resemblance to memories of childhood. Made with pannacotta
it contained no egg and few sultanas, but was glazed with caramel and was
remarkably light in texture. Also on offer were orthodox puddings such as
lemon tart, poached pears, crème brulée and sorbet.
To say that the menu is Mediterranean-inspired
is a little wide of the mark. No Italian antipasti or cheeses, Greek salad,
even a tagine - the Mediterranean does stretch to North Africa - but there
were pasta and risotto, a shish kebab, mozzarella salad and of course the
rabbit, and Sergey explained that the menu was under constant review in order
to arrive at a selection that would please most of its steadily-increasing
clientele. Where it scored was in the absence of shortcuts so that taste
was paramount, and in the generosity of its helpings. It is worth making
the journey to W11 for these qualities alone. The service was excellent,
prices normal and the wine list comprehensive.
Starters: £4 - £8; Mains £9 -£15;
Puds £4-£5
Richard Baker 1st June, 2006
Raoul's Notting Hill -
105 Talbot Road, London W11
T: 020 7229 2400
Raoul's Maida Vale - 8
Clifton Road, London W9
T: 020 7289 2400
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