Dante Mayfair at Claridge’s review: How about a five-martini dinner?
How many martinis is too many?
An obvious question comes to mind when thinking about the new restaurant at Claridge’s: Why?
Why has a quintessentially British hotel invited a restaurant from New York to open a permanent venue on their premises? Would Claridge’s not rather launch their own restaurant?
They already have one of those, I suppose. The Foyer & Reading Room rockets you into the heart of London’s most glamorous hotel. The restaurant is adjacent to the hotel’s revolving front door, which reveals a roll-call of A-Listers as you eat CFC (Claridge’s Fried Chicken).
That restaurant encapsulates the energy of a hotel that was once Queen Victoria and the late Queen’s favourite watering hole.
The other restaurant on premises has struggled to become such a destination. Claridge’s Restaurant lasted three years, the same as Simon Rogan’s Fera, and Davies and Brook occupied the space for just two. Gordon Ramsay at Claridge’s lasted 12 years but that closed more than a decade ago.
I downed another martini and staggered towards the door in what felt like a terrible Goodfellas pastiche
So while it may feel wrong on an instinctive level, there’s a business case for Dante. The Maybourne Group, which runs the hotel, has hosted successful pop-ups of the New York restaurant at two of their other hotels, France’s Maybourne Riviera and The Beverly Hills Hotel.
Italian-American restaurants are also appearing in the capital’s fanciest foyers. There’s the fairly terrible high society favourite Carbone at the new Rosewood London, and Mayfair’s Sale e Pepe Mare has just opened a second restaurant within The Langham.
Claridge’s but New York
Anyway, Dante serves high quality spins on fast food, much like the CFC in The Foyer. Opened in 1915 in Greenwich Village in Manhattan, the original Dante was famed for its unpretentious pasta and cold cuts. The menu has hardly changed in a hundred years, although the restaurant has recently expanded, with three Dantes launched in the States.
They also serve martinis – there’s a whole menu of them – and such loving care bestowed upon my favourite drink inspired me to test out the theory that five martinis over dinner is too much. Surely not? Anyway, more on that later.
Beneath striking photos of the Italian Riviera – one shows homes tumbling down the cliff edge toward the sea – I eat dishes heaped with personality.
We begin with a showstopping shrimp cocktail with a twist on horseradish sauce. Charcoal oven baked bread, gleaming in oil, is both firm and feather soft; a crudo selection – ideal in this heat – comes with citrus granola.
Fiery chicken, lashings of dressing
Chunks of tomato follow in a miraculous salad, the fruit so fleshy it could almost be steak. Peaches and marinated feta with a herb dressing is another hero dish, full of bright colours and bright flavours.
Dante’s chicken alla diavola – tender meat with a surprisingly spicy sauce that zips with the heated freshness of the paprika and marmalade rub – is yet another showstopper (how many times is this show going to be stopped, I wonder?). It’s fiery, but the green goddess dressing with yogurt, parsley and mixed herbs slings water on the fire. The chicken, plated fuss-free in half or a whole bird, comes with lashings of dressing.
Pappardelle al ragu, the house’s signature bolognese, boasted fresh ribbons of the carby stuff, but could have done with more meat.
If one is doing NYC, the smash burger feels mandatory. With provolone cheese and onion in a spongy brioche, it’s bang-on hangover food, which in my mind is the highest possible praise.
Through raunchy playlists and photography, it’s playful and louche. Live piano and waiters keen to inject a dose of New York charm bring shades of the original Dante to Mayfair.
Martinis take a higher billing than the food
Stuffy this certainly is not. But this large restaurant does lack the intimacy of the New York flagship. The pianist only being scheduled in the afternoons feels like a funny choice: surely that belongs in the evening?
At Dante, martinis take higher billing than the food. New York staff are working in London for the opening phase, including one of the head barmen, who shakes me to near leglessness. In these drinks there is no novelty for the sake of it, just flavours that absolutely crush.
Start with the titular Dante martini for the full hog, with vodka and gin, lemon bitters, dolin blanc and noilly prat. Next try the London bestseller, a lychee vesper with gin, lemon vodka, lillet rose and lychee sorbet. Next go full-throttle Greenwich Village with their take on a dirty martini: vodka or gin, olive brine, and a blue cheese olive.
Or just order anything so you can chat with the charming, intimidatingly cool US bartenders.
We shared a sticky coffee donut with whiskey flambe, and another martini, and staggered towards the door in what felt like a terrible Goodfellas pastiche.
This isn’t quite Manhattan but nor is it quite Claridge’s. I like both of those things more than I like Dante Mayfair, but it isn’t far behind.
Go to Maybourne.com