I can’t seem to keep away from Mayfair at the moment. It’s not by choice, but simply the fact that there are so many restaurant in this part of town right now – a lot more than there ever used to be. Last week alone I was dining in Mayfair at a new Pizza restaurant, sipping on cocktails at Sketch and this week – checking out local gem and gastropub, The Only Running Footman. The pub is quintessentially British, both in it terms of its drinks offering, décor and clientèle. The food however is a little more European.
We arrived here on a Friday evening and the main drinking area downstairs was absolutely rammed, full of men (like myself) pouring out on to the streets. At least that’s how it was when I visited. Fight your way through the bar however and upstairs is a tranquil dining room. It’s nice enough, but little things need adjusting. The wine glasses are very pub-like and chunky, lighting is rather dim when the evening sets in and I won’t go into detail – but the mens toilets are rather bizarre. I faced one very awkward and surreal moment. I say all this because the food here is obviously aiming higher and in this case the pub side of things really isn’t making the restaurant as attractive as it could be.
Price wise it’s not crazy either – affordable I guess you could say. Presentation here too is a strong point. A starter of new season asparagus with creamy, sour burrata and herb oil was our first dish. Flavour wise I couldn’t fault it and everything was complimenting each other, but perhaps the dish would be more enjoyed if everything was cold, because it all was – apart from the warm asparagus. Easily one of my favourite things we ate here was the Devon king prawns served on crushed ice and some awfully good home-made Marie Rose sauce for dipping. I’m a big bad of our British rosey sauce creation and here it was so good, they should be bottling the stuff and selling at the local fish markets. If you make it here, order this.
One thing that isn’t a problem here at all, is service. Our charming waitress was very attentive, fast and so was the food. There’s no messing around – just how I like it. A main course of roast new season rack of lamb was first out and served with a pomme ecrasse (crushed potato mix) shallot purée and mint jus. The lamb was excellent, cooked a perfect medium-rare and the fat rendered down well and crispy. Potatoes were nice and well seasoned too. I got a little confused with the mint jus as I couldn’t taste much in the way of mint, but instead the sauce was very red wine heavy. It was still very good, just not exactly as I’d imagined. The lamb dish, along with those prawns were definitely the star dishes here at The Only Running Footman. A braised rabbit ragout pappardelle with tomato and parmesan had a beautiful aroma when it arrived to the table, with generous lashings of permesan. A lovely fragrant dish – perfect for Spring.
Desserts are when The Only Running Footman are not quite up to scratch and matching the quality of the rest of the food. The Footman classic Eton mess was another solid offering. Filled with crunchy pavlova, luscious whippings of cream, drizzle of berry sauce and fresh berries oozing out of the top. This dish wasn’t the problem – it was the warm dark chocolate pudding with chocolate sauce and honeycomb ice-cream. Mainly it was because it sounded absolutely delicious and in fact nothing about it was. The ice cream was rather bland and vaguely resembling honeycomb and the chocolate pudding, annoyingly was so dry and cloying I could barely open and close my mouth. I have a dangerous sweet tooth and dessert is one dish which really gets me excited, it’s just a shame that this pudding couldn’t.
The Only Running Footman is a fabulous gastropub in Mayfair which has lots going for it. From fresh and juicy prawns, succulent lamb and an Eton mess to leave you salivating. The kitchen here obviously has talent and wants a lot more recognition, but I think it’s pub downstairs will always detract. The Only Running Footman is still a boozer and it’s in a boozy location so I don’t think they’ll ever get away from that. Perhaps if they make the restaurant entrance a little more prominent it would really split the two up – because both are in very different leagues and the food is really what it’s all about here.
7/10
I was invited to review
