Restaurant Gordon Ramsay

Restaurant Gordon Ramsay located on Royal Hospital Road is a three-star Michelin restaurant.  It is where we decided to spend our second last evening in London dining at one of the world’s most famous restaurants.  The front of the restaurant is very plain and we actually had to ask a local as to the whereabouts of this place.  There is only a small sign located on the side of the door that lets you know that you are at this famous restaurant. 

Once inside this “house” as I would like to call it, you are led down a dark hallway.  Inside the dining room area, there was about 12 tables altogether, 10 waiters waiting to serve you and 14 chefs inside the kitchen ready to make your food.  After getting our names we were seated at our table and served with beverages. 

Artichoke Parmesan Cheese Truffle Bun

 What I noticed the most was the ten waiters there were constantly moving and watching you.  Even going to the washroom garnered an escort from one of the staff members.  They were by your table and were always by your side in case you needed any assistance. 

Salmon Roe Wrap with Seaweed

Tonight there were the prestige and the seasonal inspiration menus that one could choose from.  Please note that the content of these menus change periodically so what we had to choose from may be quite different from what you might get to order from.  One was more expensive than the other one so we decided to go with two of the prestige menus and two of the inspirational menus. 

Quail Egg with Pudding

For appetizers, we went with the Salmon Roe Wrap with Seaweed, Quail Egg with Pudding, Green Pea Mousse with Cottage Cheese and the Artichoke Parmesan Cheese Truffle Bun.  For entrees we went with the Poached Scottish Lobster Tail with Lardo Di Colonnata, Vegetables a la Grecque and Coral Vuinaigrette, Suckling Pig, Breese Pigeon with Grilled Polenta, Smoked Ventreche, Braised Shallots and Dates, and the Deep Fried Scallops from the Isle of Skye.  For dessert, we chose the Cheese Trolley, the Mango Jasmine and Passion Fruit Juice, Agen Prune Crème Brulee, the Chocolate Cigar, Lemonade Parfait with Honey, Bergamot and Sheep’s Milk Yogurt Sorbet, and the Caramelized Tarte Tartin of Apple.

Green Pea Mousse with Cottage Cheese

We were first greeted with the Salmon Roe Wrap with Seaweed.  This delicacy was basically fresh salmon wrapped with seaweed that was topped off with a bit of red roe on top.  Many of us have had sushi before but this dish was quite different.  The fish was very fresh and the seaweed was not exactly the type of seaweed found wrapped around a piece of sushi.  It’s difficult to describe it but this dish was extremely refreshing and very tasty.  The seaweed was slightly different and not exactly the same type where we find wrapped around a piece of sushi.  The roe was nice and large and burst with flavor when biting into them.  It was definitely an excellent starter to start off the meal.

Deep Fried Scallops from the Isle of Skye

The Quail Egg with Pudding arrived next.  They were four eggs lined up beautifully in a tray and each one looked great.  I’m not a huge fan of eggs but there was no way I was going to turn down this opportunity.  As one takes a bite into this rather small egg, one doesn’t really taste much of the egg.  Most of the flavor of this dish was in my mind from a small amount pudding that contained mostly a meat sausage mix and from the fried breadcrumb that had surrounded the egg.  The entire egg almost melts in your mouth as you are chewing it making it another fantastic appetizer to start off with.   

Poached Scottish Lobster Tail with Lardo Di Colonnata

The Green Pea Mousse with Cottage Cheese arrived next and that too was amazing.  The peas with the cottage cheese were blended very smoothly and were placed at the bottom of the cup.  Small amounts of fresh vegetables were then placed on top of it.  What you have here folks was a masterpiece.  This was the best salad I have ever had.  The smoothness of the mix was smoother than the texture of a pea puree in a baby food jar. Nothing else can come close to this salad.  I absolutely loved this and if all my salads were made this way, I would have no trouble eating my vegetables every day.

Suckling Pig

The Artichoke Parmesan Cheese Truffle Bun arrived next.  With a small piece of artichoke placed on top of the truffle bun, the bun although looking rather unexciting was anything but unexciting.  Adding a touch of cheese to the whole bun brought all the parts together and actually made this a very delightful bun to have.  Honestly I thought it was very creative for the chef to create such a dish.  Separately, all the ingredients of this dish were rather boring, however by putting it altogether in such a fashion, it really brought this dish out to the forefront. 

Breese Pigeon with Grilled Polenta

The Lobster Tail looked great on presentation as the waiter placed it on our table.  We took a bite and I can tell you this was one of the most extraordinary pieces of lobster tail meat that I have ever eaten.  Surrounded by a Lardo Di Colonnata which incidentally is a piece of pork lard sprinkled with herb and aged for at least 6 months in white piece of marble from the Alps Mountains, this dish was virtually unreal in taste.  It provided a beautifully tasty salted lobster tail meat.  The meat was very tender and very fresh.  The saltiness of the lobster was rather different but different in a wonderful way in that it was one of the best lobster tails I had ever tasted. 

Cheese Trolley

I had actually ordered the Suckling Pig as my entrée.  There were five pieces of pork on this plate, all with different ingredients and make.  The center-piece was the crispy belly.  Now I know most people especially in the Asian culture would be wondering what is so special about this piece of crispy belly and truthfully I actually don’t know the answer to that question.  The crispy piece contained a layer of soft meat underneath the crispy layer as well a small layer of fat between the crispy skin and meat and the overall taste and crispiness were comparable to the suckling pig here in Canada, I could not find a major difference between the two.  Other pieces of pork contained on this plate included the spiced shoulder sausage, the roasted pork loin on potato, the Turkish Delight and the pork cheek.  My personal favorite was actually the pork cheek.  The texture was very smooth and a little fatty however because of the softness and sponginess of the pork, it was able to absorb the sauce on this plate and made the pork extra tasty.  The other pieces were more cooked and hard and as a result, were a little bit bland compared this dish despite the surrounding sauce. 

Mango Jasmine and Passion Fruit Juice

The Deep Fried Scallops were I think exactly how Chef Ramsay would love his scallops.  Nice and cooked on the inside, spongy on contact and enrich in flavor, one could not have tasted a better scallop.  There were 4 scallops nicely decorated on the plate and as which I am guessing was the cider emulsion.  It did not alter the true taste of the scallops and if anything, it actually brought out the flavor of the scallops even more.  A wonderful seafood dish to have with the scallops cooked to perfection.

The best meal of the night had to been the Breese Pigeon.  The meat on this pigeon was almost comparable to the duck two previous nights ago at Ramsay’s other restaurant.  It was soft and tender and the sauce they used was beautiful.  The smoked ventreche was basically a piece of smoke bacon but placed alongside the pigeon it really enhanced the overall dish.  The aroma of the shallots made the entire dish mouth watering.  The chefs certainly did not disappoint.  Like the duck on the previous night, this was one dish that I would not have mind have a second piece to it as it was absolutely amazing. It was in my opinion the best entrée of the 4 that we had ordered that evening.

The 5 Cheeses The Waiter Chose

By the time dessert rolled around we were all pretty full yet there was no way we were going to turn anything down. They gave us a complementary drink first which was the Mango, Jasmine and Passion fruit juice which certainly had created a wow factor in it.  The combination of all those exotic fruits all in one cup gave the drink a certain zing to it.  We were all very surprised at how juicy, how exotic yet so spine-tingling this juice was.

Chocolate Cigar

The highlight of the night was the Cheese Trolley and pending on how you look at it this could have been the highlight or the lowlight.  The waiters basically roll out a trolley that contained about 20 different kinds of cheeses.  I made the mistake in letting the waiter choose the 5 best ones because there were just too many to choose from.  The waiter said he was going to give me the 5 most popular cheeses in that region.  HAHA BIG MISTAKE!! Three of the five cheeses were outstanding however there were 2 cheeses that I would HIGHLY recommend to you never to try unless you are the most adventurous people on the planet.  The waiter placed on my plate a piece of Stinky Bishop and a piece of Brie De Meaux.  No words could describe the taste of the cheese.  Both were quite creamy in texture, the latter was crazy heavy in ammonia.  Just taking a small nibble at them was enough to make you turn blue.  The best way to describe the taste was that it was like eating a piece of cheese that had been wrapped in a stinky dirty wet sock that had been left there moist for the past month.  Enough said!!

Switching gears we had to find a dessert to offset that cheesy taste. The smoked chocolate cigar dessert was placed on our table which was dark chocolate rolled up into a cigar.  The chocolate was very sweet, maybe a touch too sweet in my mind however if you are a lover of dark chocolate, this dessert was for you.  With a small scoop of cardamom ice cream as well, this rich dessert was an absolute life saver especially right after having that cheesy dessert. 

Lemonade Parfait with Honey, Bergamot and Sheep’s Milk Yogurt Sorbet

My favorite dessert of the night had to have been the Lemonade Parfait with Honey, Bergamot and Sheep’s Milk Yogurt Sorbet.  The Bergamot was thinly sliced and rolled up into a cylinder.  It was rich in an orange-tangy like taste to it and it was yummy!!  I loved the yogurt sorbet since I’m not a huge fan of yogurt but when made like this, I will certainly eat this yogurt any day. 

Agen Prune Crème Brulee

The Caramelized Tarte Tartin of Apple was very similar to the apple pie I had 2 nights previous at his other restaurant.  The same type of sweet apple sauce was used to bring out the flavor of the apple.  This dish was more or less an apple tart made similarly to his apple pie.  It was very sweet and tasting and a great alternative if you didn’t want chocolate for the evening. 

Caramelized Tarte Tartin of Apple

Somewhere in there, there was also a coconut soufflé mixed with chocolate sauce and a small scoop of a sorbet ice cream.  Again similar to the soufflé that was given to us 2 nights before, the soufflé was equal to its sister’s chef soufflé so no need to elaborate further other than to say, what another wonderful dessert to have.

Coconut Souffle

The final complimentary dessert of the evening was The White Chocolate and Strawberry Ice Cream Spheres mixed with Dry Ice.  Place in pot of liquid nitrogen, this ice cold dessert is one for the ages.  The ice cream is inside this pastry which is then placed in a bowl.  Nitrogen is poured in which gives it a smoky appearance and ice cold taste to it.  This was crazy amazing and a must try for any dessert loving person. 

The White Chocolate and Strawberry Ice Cream Spheres mixed with Dry Ice

Overall it was a wonderful, wonderful experience.  Service was amazing all night and the head waiter even brought my friend and I into the back kitchen for a grand tour of the kitchen so we could watch the chefs make the food.  We met the sous chef for the evening and even snapped a photo with him.  Yes again it was a little pricy with the prestige menu roughly $200.00 CDN per person but who cares.  It was an experience that you will never ever forget.  Only recommendation, avoid the Stinky Bishop and you will be A-OK! Thank you to the staff at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay for having us. It was an amazing evening.  A definite 5++ out of 5 for the evening.