Playful, satisfying and occasionally baffling, there is lots to love at Emily Roux’s new restaurant
Having the name Roux hanging around your neck must be a mixed blessing. It’s terrifically handy, I’m sure, when you’re starting a new restaurant and want to attract attention, as Emily Roux, daughter of Michel Jr and grandchild of Albert, proved last October when unveiling Caractère in Notting Hill, west London. Still, the name Roux also means Le Gavroche in Mayfair, a dining spot that will be cited time and again by chefs and experts as not merely a restaurant, but the restaurant. Le Gavroche is a chintzy Mecca for stuffed shirts, and it’s catnip to moneyed baby boomers who want a real occasion that involves highfalutin but ultimately identifiable French classics – filet de boeuf, mousselline de homard – and impeccable, forlock-tugging service. These people will be disappointed by Caractère, however, because it offers neither of these things.
This Italian-French joint took the place of a branch of Bumpkin on a corner of Westbourne Park Grove, and has Brett Graham’s The Ledbury and Clare Smyth’s Core close at hand. But Caractère’s menu is set out in such an opaque manner – split into six sections marked “curious”, “subtle”, “delicate”, “robust”, “strong” and “greedy” – that the server immediately caves as he hands over the list, explaining which ones are starters, mains and puddings. He needs to, or else nobody would get fed. What makes a fancy braised leek tart or scallops on radicchio “curious”? Or roast jerusalem artichokes on beurre noisette “subtle”? And if you’re paying 11 quid for a bowl of chocolate pudding, do you really want to be called “greedy”?
Grace Dent’s restaurant reviews appear in the award-winning food magazine Feast, along with recipes by Yotam Ottolenghi and more top cooks, with the Guardian every Saturday.
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