db Eats: Petrus

There are good points and bad points in any restaurant. So let’s start with the  bad points…
Well…OK, that’s it.

Now the good points: this was an exemplary lunch. Of the three menus at the newly-opened Knightsbridge restaurant, the business lunch offers exceptional value at £25 for three courses but with limited choice, the à la carte presents three courses for £55 with a much greater choice and then there’s the tasting menu at £65 for loads of courses.

We went for the à la carte, which turned out to be just the ticket. First came a delicate onion velouté as an amuse bouche. Sweet and creamy, it off-set the amazing lemon grass pop corn and the freshest of brown and white bread.

Then came the real starters, a tuna tartare with Osciestra caviar and cream – good but not as good as Nobu – and an exceptional roasted langoustine with confit potatoes and watercress soup.

Next up came two superb main courses, duck breast with a braised beetroot and ginger sauce, plus an excellent fillet of halibut with citron sauce and a delicious slice of grilled fennel, accompanied by pommes dauphinoise and sautéed carrots plus more beetroot.

Both dishes were elegant, beautifully presented and very top drawer with more than a taste of three star cooking.

Then it was time for the puddings – wow! Worth every penny of the £30 you’re paying on top of the business lunch.

We started with small ice cream cones as a pre-dessert, and then a chocolate sphere which was metallised green just like a giant ball bearing, containing bits of honeycomb all floating in milk ice cream and then a jug of hot melted chocolate poured over the sphere which subsided gracefully into itself – wonderful taste, magnificent presentation and spellbinding theatre.

My guest’s dessert competed admirably: a toffee apple made from poached apple, skinned and cored, then baked with caramel; essentially a tarte tatin without the pastry.

And then came the theatre. The removed core was replaced by a new core of sage yoghurt parfait, before a multitude of caramel sauce was poured slowly over the whole thing. It’s hard to think of anything that could beat the chocolate sphere, but the apple nearly did.

We rounded off the meal with coffee and petit fours, which involved more chocolate and ice cream covered in white chocolate, served in a small silver container with dry ice.

The service was impeccable, the room very comfortable (not my idea of Belgravia gun dealer chic!) and both formal and relaxing – all in all a smashing lunch and without anything to drink other than fizzy water and two coffees a very reasonable £139 for two including service.

Petrus
1 Kinnerton Street
Knightsbridge
London
SW1X 8EA
T: +44 (0)207 592 1609

db, 25.05.2010