I was coming back down from a weekend up north and wanted somewhere to go close to King’s Cross station for Sunday lunch. I’ve been into St Pancras a few times and thought I’d check out St Pancras Grand.
It’s certainly an impressive setting. Based on the upper level of St Pancras and adjacent to the champagne bar, the restaurant is all mirrors, shiny metal and dark material and it seems to be trying to recreate the elegance of a bygone era.
It has a feel of the Orient Express about it, as it tries to get travellers to treat themselves to something a bit more exotic than a pre-packaged Pret sandwich before their departure – to be honest, it is probably more appealing for a romantic trip to Paris than a journey to Milton Keynes!
The menu comprises a number of British classics, oysters and had a special set Christmas menu (expensive at £39.95 for three courses & a ‘free’ Christmas bellini). It is similar to a menu you might find at the Wolseley or the Ivy. It’s quite expensive, although there are usually a number of deals available sites like Top Table.The restaurant was probably around a third full and we were given a lovely table close to the jazz band that they have playing on a Sunday and were brought a basket of ok warm white bread.
I decided to keep it simple and went for the sausages and mash and Grace went for the two course Christmas menu and had turkey. We also decided to share a side of roasted winter veg.
We were served quite quickly, but from then on things went down hill.
Sausage & Mash
The sausage and mash were fine. The pork sausages were well cooked and lightly seasoned. Personally I’d prefer a coarser Cumberland sausage with more seasoning, but you can’t have everything. The mash was good, very smooth and buttery. The red wine gravy was quite intense and reduced to quite a thick consistency. Personally I liked it and overall it was a decent, if relatively expensive sausage and mash (£12.00).
Roast Turkey with roast potatoes, brussel sprouts and cranberry sauce.
G’s turkey was also ok. A generous slab of turkey breast that was moist and had a good flavour to it. The highlight were the crispy roast potatoes, which were excellent. The rest of the dish in G's words was 'unmemorable'.
The roasted veg was a let down. The carrots and parsnips were bland and under seasoned and the beetroot was undercooked in the middle.It was after the mains that things started to deteriorate service wise.
First up, there was no sign of the bellini, so I asked the waiter about it. He told us he didn’t think we wanted it (nice of him to decide for us) and so hadn’t brought it over. As we’d finished our mains I told him not to bother!
Secondly was the delivery of our desserts.
I went for sticky toffee pudding and G for dark chocolate terrine with raspberry sorbet from the set menu. The desserts came out about ten minutes later, but were completely different from what we ordered and so we sent them back.
Another ten minutes later they reappeared. Things improved this time as they managed to get one of them right, but they still managed to get one wrong and so, for a second time, we sent a dessert back. There was no apology forthcoming and our waiter was distinctly unimpressed by this. You could see him complaining to one of his colleagues about us right in view of us. Not very professional and it made us feel like we were in the wrong!
They left us with the correct one and as it was a warm dessert I had to tuck in whilst we waited for the other to appear. It’s a good job I did, as after another ten minutes I was finished and there was still no sign of the other dessert. This time the manager came over to remove our plates (he wasn’t aware of the problem) and we had to explain that we had only received one dessert. To be fair to him, he was very apologetic and the dessert appeared soon after, though not before we spotted our friendly waiter rolling his eyes at us again!
We finished dessert and asked for the bill. Fortunately they decided to remove the service charge (I would’ve hit the roof if they’d left it on) and the whole dessert episode completely spoiled what would’ve been an ok meal.
It seems we weren’t the only ones to experience the poor service. On the way out I saw a guy come into the restaurant as he had a reservation. He was asked to go back outside into the freezing cold and wait by the unmanned reservations desk for the rest of his party. You could tell by the look on his face that this left him completely baffled!
It’s such a shame that the service let the place down, as St Pancras Grand has the potential to be a fine way to start any trip.
