Petrus

I went there for lunch today. I was given a warm welcome by Jean-Philippe and shown to my table. The amuse bouche was hot onion soup which was nice even though I hate onions!

For starter I had the Shellfish linguini with a lobster and tomato bisque which was absolutely divine!

For mains I had the Sea bream with a fennel and dill salad, apple velouté accompliced with dauphinois potatoes and broccoli. I was surprised at how large the portion was.

For pre-dessert I had small cone filled with ice cream.

For dessert I had Chocolate sphere with milk ice cream and honeycomb which was one of the best dessert I’ve ever had.

My last course was a wonderful visual spectacle. It was a bowl of cold nitrogen filled with white chocolate ice lollies!

Overall the food was excellent with friendly and efficient service.
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Mr CM - View all reviews by this user
9 Overall rating
Food 9 | Service 9 | Atmosphere 9 | Value for money 8
Friday, October 29, 2010

My boyfriend took me here for my birthday, this is definitely a place for a special occasion. The food, restaurant and service was faultless. I would recommend this place.
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- View all reviews by this user
9 Overall rating
Food 10 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8
Wednesday, October 20, 2010

We went to Petrus for lunch a week or so ago. It's dull. The room is like an airport club class lounge. And the food is perfectly passable, but feels passionless. The chocolate honeycomb sphere was fun, as were the frozen lollypops, but both lacked the finesse that should accompany the fun.

The food service was okay, if a little tense, but the greeter was lousy.

I wouldn't want to come here on a date, for a business meeting or as a gourmet treat.

Oh, and the chocolate that comes in a little drawer at the end was inedible. Inedible chocolate - how do you manage that!
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June
4 Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 4 | Atmosphere 2 | Value for money 3
Monday, August 02, 2010

First visit today at a quite busy Saturday lunchtime. All four of us enjoyed our meals, However we usually go to other restaurants in the same group such as Royal Hospital Road, Murano and Maze at least a couple of times a year each, and in general my conclusion is that Petrus won't be taking over from any of these in our affections.

We all had a set lunch comprising a choice from three starters and three mains with lots of puddings. It started with an Amuse -Bouche of a flavoursome tomato consomme with fresh vegetables which we all liked. Equally we all enjoyed our starters, and my lightly curried pollock in a cauliflower soup was delicious. Mains were less good. The selection wasn't tremendously interesting and indeed all three dishes we selected were rather plain; nicely cooked and presented but nothing unusual, interesting or indeed complicated. And no intense flavours. We've noticed before that eating in fine restaurants in spring and summer tends to result in blander, seasonal food. Maybe thats it , but there was certainly no excitement round the table for any of the mains, and one of us was surprised that the skin on the bream had been left notably uncrisped.

Choice of desserts was good and the choice difficult. But again the eating experience didn't match our expectation, and certainly my little orange meringue tart was verging on dull. The chocolate sphere was felt to be a little over the top

The place itself was smart, expensive, though a bit atmosphere free, though its by no means alone in this. Certainly the investment in the premises might be enough to convince that this restaurant is aimed at a slot alongside Murano and Maze. But as i say, the food doesn't seem to justify that , at least not to us. Service was good, but again you'd say that it wasn't quite as slick as elsewhere in the group. I'm conscious of the fact that the place is pretty new and maybe things will improve.

Value was about right we thought in their competitive context- though I might add that the wines we had from near the bottom of the list (£30) were not special. I don't expect wines in a restaurant like this to be cheap; I do hope for some evidence that they've been well chosen to make the price-tag worthwhile.

All told, given the enjoyment we've had elsewhere in this group over the years, we walked into Petrus with high expectations and left just a little disappointed. With Marcus Wareing just up the road, Zafferano round the corner and, I noticed, Pierre Koffman opening close by, its becoming quite a competitive area .
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David Henderson
7 Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 8 | Atmosphere 6 | Value for money 7
Sunday, July 04, 2010

I was lucky enough to be taken by some work people, and they booked the chefs table which is on its own downstairs, bang opposite the service hatch. After a very agreeable drink in the lovely bar area, we headed down for what turned into a 10 course feast, beautifully matched with 4 different wines by the charming somelier.

We started with a board of charcuterie, with rocket and a delicious crumbled parmesan, and it just got better from there. Onion veloute, foie grois, scallops, sea trout, beef wellington, creme brulee, mascarpone ice cream, and the utterly sensational chocolate sphere.

Plenty of nibbles followed with coffee and brandies, chocolate covered almonds, 72% chocolate slabs, fresh baked mandelines, and the very dramatic frozen in liquid nitrogen amaretto lollies.

Mr Askew was present and he spend a good deal of time talking to us about the food and the restaurant, and seemlessly controlled everything which left his kitchen, which was like no other I've seen, everything was effortless and immaculate.

We stayed late into the afternoon and saw some of the evenings food being prepped.

All the staff from the very top to the guys scrubbing the floors were charming, friendly and genuinely looked like they loved being there.

The highlight for us all, were the boulangere potatos, slow cooked in double cream chicken stock and thyme. I'm drooling just thinking of it.

Big thanks to all.
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Dan Briggs
10 Overall rating
Food 10 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 10 | Value for money 10
Tuesday, May 25, 2010