Wiltons, Green Park

http://www.wiltons.co.uk/home

55 Jermyn Street
London SW1Y 6LX

Reservations 0207 629 9955


Wiltons is a very exclusive and very pricey restaurant. The kind that requires men wear a jacket (if you fail to adhere to this standard then you will be given one of the house jackets). The staff are extremely friendly and sub-servant, bordering on sycophantic. I'm sure the usual clientele are more than happy with this but the air of formality was a little unsettling and fake.

That being said, as I found out later in the week, it is better to offer this kind of service than veer towards the other end of the spectrum, but more on that later. Back to Wiltons, we were offered a lovely champagne rose, then moved on to our starters. I opted for the seafood salad as a starter, and while the offerings of crab, salmon and especially the eel were delicious it was perhaps a little too much, and I'd advise others to only opt for this as a main. One of the group offered caviar and my first impressions are it's okay, but not worth the trouble.

We tried a lovely Shiraz from Chile, then moved on to the mains. I selected the rump of lamb - a surprisingly large offering, but the sauce was fantastic and if it were not for the size of my starter I feel I would have enjoyed this course more. For dessert I tried the chocolate fondant - a touch too rich for my liking - then ended the night with whisky.

The service turned out to be very good, accommodations constantly made to any requests our table made, new napkins proffered whenever someone vacated their seat, all in all they were very attentive and never left us waiting for long.

The layout of the restaurant is deceptively large as form the front the restaurant seems very small. There are lots of little booths and seating 'catches', but the lack of natural light made me very sleepy.

Wiltons strikes me a nice treat, a chance to view another world, but the cost and stuffiness cost it a couple of marks.

Rating: 7/10
Average Rating: 7/10 (1)