May 6, 2022 Capital A List - Celebrity club news
The Warehouse at The Conduit Club restaurant in London is known for its excellence in working with seasonal and fresh, locally-sourced produce. The result is an ever-changing proposal that highlights the full potential of every single ingredient. The Warehouse was initially a fruit and vegetable warehouse at Covent Garden. Its origins are reflected on the menu, serving dishes that carry traditional preservation methods mixed with modern and innovative modes of preparation. Heritage ingredients lay at the core value of the restaurant, presented and celebrated on every single plate.
And what do we get from that? An everchanging menu, ever-charming. Each month you may find something new as the seasons change, and fresh ingredients come to the peak of their flavor. Taste dishes like smoked venison with licorice sauce and beetroots or an entire plaice fish served on the bone with a fermented pea, butter, and herbs sauce. Maybe try something as simple as a grass-fed steak with brown butter and smoked pepper, sensing the flavor complexity of each ingredient as they balance each other out.
Here, although meat and fish may come as the central aspect of a dish, there are always fresh seasonal vegetables, fruits, and herbs on the side that shine with caramelized and smoked flavors. On the menu’s first page, you get to read about the farmers and producers behind most of the fresh ingredients served in these intricate and beautifully crafted dishes.
The cobalt blue walls and ceiling contrast with the orange lighting from big circular hay lamps hanging above the bar. On the floor, large baskets hold tall plants with green leaves that complement the eclectic design of the space. The wooden chairs, stone floors, and bricked back walls contribute to a homely feel, reminding customers of the proximity to nature the restaurant offers. It is as if provençal France met Mykonos beach vacations.
Capital A List members can make bookings for Warehouse at The Conduit Club below.
Cuisine: British
Dress Code: Casual
Area: Covent Garden
Address: 6 Langley St, London WC2H 9JA, United Kingdom
Website: https://www.warehouselondon.com/
April 30, 2022 Capital A List - Celebrity club news
Corrigan’s Mayfair belongs to the Irish chef Richard Corrigan, serving locally sourced game food that follows seasonality and praises every ingredient’s flavor, with dishes inspired by traditional British and Irish cooking. Corrigan believes that “Game is not just what you hunt and shoot, game is what you catch, what you pick and forage. For me, game is a wild blackberry you pick, mackerel you catch, and a native oyster you shuck. This is game reflective of the seasons.” From this statement, one can already imagine the intricate and complex dishes served at the restaurant.
Open for lunch and dinner, the place offers an a la carte menu and a fixed-price tasting option, which changes weekly according to the seasonal availability of every ingredient. Here you can explore flavors from the mountains and the ocean – Start with a spiced beef tartare served with oyster cream, nori, and tempura. Then, move to the native Scottish lobster ravioli with lobster bisque and vadouvan, a curry-like spice mixed with garlic and shallots. As for the main course, maybe taste a juicy pork belly with cabbage, apple, and mustard or a roasted blonde ray with broccoli, saffron, and mussels.
The design of Corrigan’s Mayfair restaurant does a beautiful job reflecting the culture of game, and in each dish, you can taste the freedom of ingredients. The calming blue-toned design of the place when you first enter contrasts with the roughness of game food, and it is perfect when put together with brown leather booths by the bar counter. Inside, different seating areas embrace a more robust decor, with dim lighting and darker shades of green and blue on the walls. There’s even a tiny leathered red booth by a big bookshelf, where you can see all the action from the kitchen as you indulge in private and exclusive dining.
Capital A List members can make bookings for Corrigan’s Mayfair below.
Cuisine: British and Irish
Dress Code: Smart Casual
Area: Mayfair
Address: 28 Upper Grosvenor St, London W1K 7EH, United Kingdom
Website: https://www.corrigansmayfair.co.uk/
April 29, 2022 Capital A List - Celebrity club news
Imagine what it would be like to be served an entire piglet. Imagine it roasted to a golden point, with crusty and salty skin, juicy meat, and truffled adobo rice and lemongrass stuffing. This famous dish is the lechon. You need to order it two days in advance, and it is ideal for a group of six to eight people. This is the experience proposed by chef Ferdinand Montoya at his restaurant Sarap in London.
Montoya is originally from the Philippines and has been working at London restaurants for about ten years. He always had the dream of serving authentic Filipino ingredients in a non-authentic manner. The lechon is a perfect example of that. The restaurant welcomes you with bamboos decorating the terrace. It is the chef’s expression of his culture, who tailored it to impress and provoke those who come to dine.
The interior design is simple, not the caricature-like environment people usually expect when entering an eastern Asian establishment. Blue walls contrast with the wood furniture and the white ceiling, and the decor is minimal. Dim lighting shines over the tables and booths. A green, back wall filled with plants completes the visual aspect of the restaurant.
Aside from the renowned lechon, the menu is not extensive. It highlights each dish and its complex flavor characteristics with a beautiful presentation. The Trout Kinilaw consists of tender fish pieces with coconut vinegar and rhubarb to add aroma to the plate. There’s also the grilled poussin with juicy meat, accompanied by lemongrass and calamansi (a small hybrid lemon from the Philippines) paste.
There are also plenty of vegetarian options. The Ensaladang Talong is made with eggplants, tomato, and duck egg. The vegan Ginataang Kalabasa consists of butternut squash and mung beans served inside a pumpkin. In contrast to the food, the wine menu is long, with bottles from different vintages and regions of the world.
Capital A List members can make bookings for Sarap below.
Cuisine: Filipino
Dress Code: Smart Casual
Area: Mayfair
Address: 10 Heddon St, London W1B 4BX, United Kingdom
Website: https://www.saraplondon.com/sarap-home
April 6, 2022 Capital A List - Celebrity club news
The Planque restaurant in London defines itself as a “wine drinkers’ clubhouse.” They offer a membership for wine enthusiasts, where people can get together and share their passion for the beverage over fine food and meaningful conversation. They have priority when reserving tables at the restaurant and can attend all wine events. Members can also store their wine in the house cellar and use private dining spaces and the club lounge.
The restaurant, which seats 40 customers, has an intricate and characteristic design, with simple wooden tables and booths inside a cellar-like architectural wonder. Cobalt blue oval walls surround the large tables in private spaces, creating an intimate environment perfect for long meals with wine and friends. The rest of the area is very homey, perfect for the establishment’s proposal. The decor is simple, with books filling up shelves by the beige walls and bottles of wine lying in the cellar on the back. They also have a store on-site for those who want to take food or wine to go and purchase quality kitchen equipment. Natural light comes in through the large windows.
The food is French-inspired, served to match the wines and environment. Prawn dumplings with consommé or Liver Parfait with terrine are an example of that. You can also savor the grilled lamb cutlets with spring greens and nettles. Maybe go for the Rosella di Lusia with hazelnuts and mandarins, pairing that up with fresh white wine. Their desserts are well spoken of, like the milk chocolate tart with prune ice cream. Think large family Sunday meals, and you will know what to expect.
Capital A List members can make bookings for Planque below.
Cuisine: French
Dress Code: Smart Casual
Area: Haggerstone
Address: 322-324 Acton Mews, London E8 4EA, United Kingdom
Website: https://planque.co.uk/
April 6, 2022 Capital A List - Celebrity club news
Manteca is an Italian-inspired restaurant in London that focuses on hand-rolled plates of pasta, an in-house salumeria, and whole-animal butchery. They bake the bread over a wood fire, granting the typical black chars over crispy crusts, with a soft and chewy interior. Inside the restaurant, the decor embraces different shades of brown, from the walls to the ceiling and the furniture.
The space is small, and one may wonder how they can fit so many people inside without it getting cramped, but it doesn’t happen — every inch is perfectly calculated, and customers and staff move gracefully through the dining room. Light-colored booths cover the sidewall, alongside chalky blacks bricks with small green bouquets of plants hanging in front, and behind them, you can take a glimpse of the kitchen and the action happening inside. The rest of the furniture, tables and chairs with no particular extravagance are spread across the dining room.
The menu avenges all the extravagance lacking in the interior design. Visitors praise every item, and everything is a “must try.” Pasta dishes come in two sizes, where you can order smaller portions or regular ones — the cacio e pepe, a house favorite, comes with crab meat that surprisingly does not deliver that seafood flavor people would expect. Instead, it complements the savory aspect of the cheese and dances with its umami. The fried pork with apple mustard and the ‘nduja steamed mussels are other unique flavor combinations. They butcher the meat on-site, and customers can see the cold cults hanging by the kitchen. The cocktails divide into classic and house recipes, where you can find creative variations of classics like Mai Tai and Old Fashioned. The wine list is long and offers various wines from Italy and international options.
Capital A List members can make bookings for Manteca below.
Cuisine: Italian
Dress Code: Smart Casual
Area: Shoreditch
Address: 49-51 Curtain Rd, London EC2A 3PT, United Kingdom
Website: https://www.mantecarestaurant.co.uk/