SIGNS of the times are tiresome when too assiduously noted,
but, all the same, it is hard to resist drawing some parallel between a recessionary economic climate and the regressive tendency of a wilfully hopeful band of restaurateurs. Looking over one's shoulder at the glittering days of the past has become something of a habit among those in the eating trade; each month brings with it a freshly paint-licked reinvention, reincarnation or refurbishment of a once celebrated restaurant. Sir Ter- ence's Quaglino's is the most obviously striking example. L'Escargot, which at time of writing is firing on half its cylinders, appeals to a memory so recent it can scarcely go by the name of nostalgia. The two restaurants here, Daphne's and, on the site of the old Menage a Trois, Beau- champ Place, evoke restaurantdom's headi- est days, the glamorous patch between mid- Sixties to early Seventies and the eccentri- cally innovative early Eighties.
Of course, both restaurants outlived their fashionableness, but it is the era in which they sprang which gives them their interest. Daphne's very name conjures up such a cheerily clipped English spraunciness. I don't know anything about the Daphne Rye who started the whole thing — a cross between 'the Mirabelle and a Chelsea bistro' — but I like to imagine her as a mix- ture of Shelley Winters, Glynis Johns and Judi Dench (to be played by Julie Walters in the film), all turquoise chiffon and gay ways, puffing at a cigarette with an upturned face and administering cocktails to men who looked like David Niven, or indeed to David. Niven.
That, at any rate, was the sort of joint she ran. Mogens Tholstrup, who has taken over the place, has created a very different atmosphere from the one the legendary Daphne and owners since have cultivated. The mood, for all the swirling Florentine ironwork at the entrance, is decidedly Milano-funk: stone on the floor, the walls, part-brick, part-ochre plasterwork effect dimly glistering with gold-painted squares, with a pale, glass-roofed, tree-lined room extending out behind. It works.
Tholstrup's last gig was Est, a small but mostly full and always noisy room in Frith Street serving new-wave Italian. His chef there, Eddie Baines, has come along and in his new environment splendidly shows his pedigree (The River Café and Bibendum): food is elegant but not prissy, and even in these early days maintains an impressive standard, not matched by the service.
Risotto, with prawns and rocket, was fra- grant, soft and sticky, perfectly cooked all'onda, almost soupy in its luxuriant creaminess, yet with the pearls of rice still firm to the bite. The prawns, fat and large, were really superfluous here, though not intrusively so. Sea bass sprinkled with the chopped fresh constituents of a bouquet garni, with more of a dressing than a sauce, of balsamic vinegar and glass-green olive oil — though perhaps just a bit too much of it — was like summer on the tongue. Lob- ster ravioli were sweet and meaty.
For pudding, the almond and plum tart was light and crumbly, the fruit wedged with marzipan, but the panna cotta, erro- neously described as panecotta (implying cooked bread rather than cooked cream) was ill-judged: the addition of apricot purée gave it the taste and texture of Heinz baby food. With several bottles of Evian, a couple of vodka martinis and a half-bottle of raspberryish Chilean cabernet sauvi- gnon, the bill came, with the 15 per cent `optional' service charge, to just under £80.
Beauchamp Place is not nearly as suc- cessful. David Wilby, who is in the kitchen, cooks strong stuff with a light touch — angel-hair pasta with goat's cheese, leeks and some lacy shavings of lemon rind and sausage of pigs' trotters and calves' sweet- breads on a mound of mashed potato were both roundly satisfying — and his co-owner Eddie Khoo's wine-list is a joy (the Domaine de Jalousie, fresh and grassy and spiky, is pleasurable and — for Knights- bridge — affordable at £8.50), but the place lacks swing. This is partly because of the fact that it is in a neck-compacting base- ment and partly due to their efforts to hide that fact: the decor is hideous, with enough wrought-iron to make you feel you're a prisoner in cell block H, with some mad mosaicky hankering after Gaudi to boot. Still, the prices are good for the area, starters averaging £4, main courses at twice that and the grub good: it's not that the place disappoints, it merely fails to delight.
Daphne's, 112 Draycott Ave, London SW3, tel: 071 589 4257; Beauchamp Place, 15 Beauchamp Place, London SW3, tel: 071 589 4252
Nigella Lawson
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