Mosimann’s Club, Restaurant Exclusive Hire

A quaint restaurant with an old English vibe. Tasty food, wide menu and a friendly staff makes for a superb atmosphere. They have nice wines which are properly curated. Perfect place for fine dining and group dining events too. Good value for money. Good value for money.

We had the most exasperatingly bad time tonight. The place keeps up a pretence of sophistication, but there is no longer anything about it that supports that – it’s worn out, the service is haphazard and the food is dreadful. We had a private room booked. We were welcomed in a perfunctory way, told to go upstairs to the bar and that we would be greeted by our personal butler. We were ignored for a good few minutes then offered a champagne. There was no choice or even an explanation of what we were drinking – at least offer the latter. We were then taken to the Mont Blanc room which is tired, tiny and either hot or cold, depending on whether or not you put the ancient aircon on. The music playing through a cheap portable speaker was terrible. In fairness, we were offered an equally tired iPad to choose our own playlist — except the WiFi is also terrible and nothing would load. One of the many staff apologised, but didn’t offer a solution. The menu could not have been more basic: bland salmon on bland salmon with a bit of leaf and sharp vinaigrette, a slightly stringy mushroom risotto and the old warhorse of the Mosimann bread and butter pudding, which was served almost cold. The steak was tough and we had to send it back. We got very little apology and were just offered ‘sea bass’. Again, no description. A tepid, flavourless, undercooked slab of wet fish arrived 20 minutes later, on a bed of what was basically black bean sauce — we could get the same dish, but significantly better, from a local Chinese restaurant. The dedicated waiter turned out to be five different people, who comedically popped in and out, at times asking what the previous person had offered. They varied from charming (a man called Brian and a woman whose name I sadly can’t remember, but she was ace) to an indifferent sommelier and waiter and one other who was clueless — who started (and then gave up) trying to explain a very simple dish. Perhaps he realised he was just stating the obvious. The whole thing was awkward and depressing. The only thing we really looked forward to all evening was leaving.