I love to try new restaurants. Like a birthday present, there is the excitement of examining the outside, and exploring what shiny novelties lie within. But sometimes, like dear old Proust, I yearn to return to the places I have known and loved. To recapture the experience and understand it in a new way – and because being away for too long makes me a little bit sad.
My birthday present, or at least my birthday dinner, or at least one of the shamefully large number of food events I arranged around my birthday (see reviews of Bocca di Lupo, Bompas and Parr's Parlimentary Waffle House, The Brass Rail and Mennula), was brunch at The Wolseley.
The Wol is much-vaunted as the best brunch in town, a claim that is extremely defensible - as opposed to its other reputation as the hang-out of celebrities (oh REALLY? I've never seen any. Like I didn't see any for the goddamn year I lived in Hampstead - and I'm a good spotter - I'm the sort of person who can pick out Tom Parker-Bowles or David Mellor in a crowded room). For this reason, they ban cameras. Yes I know. I was sneaky.
The Wol used to be a car showroom and all I can say is that those must have been happier days for the motor industry. The tiled floor, elegant panelling and man-about-town debonairness of the venue are pure Jeeves and Wooster, and speak of a lifestyle half the people in the room used to enjoy and the other half wish they did.
However, it avoids being stuffy - the management have taken the tasty wheat of, say, the Dorchester or Fortnum's, and sloughed off the chaff of uber-reliance on obscure tea varieties and waiterly upper lips. The dining room is smart and classy, but it's not Fortnum and Mason's does Ye Olde Englandeland.
Although The Wol is supremely popular, it has the good sense to set aside tables that cannot be reserved. Therefore of a weekend, you can chip up merrily at 10-ish and wait in the little coffee bar to the side of the entrance while a table is found. Read the papers. Sip an orange juice. Pretend you're on a film set. Or are about to meet friends called Biffy and Bertie (Bertie is a girl).
On this occasion, however, we (I) booked ahead for a weekday morning and were given a table which was one of only 4 in tiny balconies overlooking the throng. These, delightfully, come with their own electronic call buttons, which sadly I couldn't think of an excuse to use. I would ask for this table again - the view is lovely - and make sure to accidentally drop my napkin over the side so it can be fetched by a technologically-summoned garcon.
It is worth basing your order around crockery and silverware. I'm absolutely serious about this. Always get tea or coffee. The tea set is gorgeous, and one pot provides enough tea for about 6 cups.
After the non-negotiables (tea and orange juice) I chose, as I usually do, the Omelette Arnold Bennett. This is a small egg dish made with flaked smoked haddock and is simply scrumptious. It is deep and rich - order with a rack of toast (several breads available) and use the bread like an absorbent spoon to lift bits of omelette to your mouth.
I tried my companions' haggis with duck egg and it was good, but I stand firmly by the OAB. A note on the kedgeree (which I've had on a previous visit): it is too creamy. Kedgeree should not be hugely rich. It is. However, the pastries are particularly good, as is the lunch menu, should you find yourself unable to leave and time is drifting towards the prandial portion of the day.
I love coming here, and I will come as long as I have means and legs. And I will most likely reminisce about it boringly, although I can probably limit myself to just the 2,000 pages. Thank god they don't serve madeleines …
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