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Joris Minne: Fitzwilliam Hotel
Fitz the bill
Friday, 24 April 2009
enlargeBelfast’s latest luxury hotel is the perfect spot for lunch... but only if you’re lucky enough to have a fat expense account
Much vaunted, the new Belfast Fitzwilliam Hotel’s opening was preceded by a flurry of media reports about the remarkable restaurant talents who were about to set Belfast’s culinary scene on fire. The mighty Kevin Thornton was going to ride into town from Dublin with his catering cohorts, shake us all by the scruff of the neck and show us what a proper dinner looks and tastes like. It was time for Belfast to shift up a gear and fall in behind the Irish capital’s fancy ways and “get all growed up”, as they say in parts of southern Leitrim.
Meanwhile, in Belfast, the restaurant industry studiously ignored this. There were occasional grumbles later on when the Fitzwilliam’s doors were about to open and some of Belfast’s better restaurateurs woke up to find their staff had defected. But apart from this, no one else noticed anything different. Two months on and still not much sign of life from the heavily draped windows in the modern edifice next door to the Grand Opera House, I decided to pay a visit with the adviser.
The imposing seven-storey building completes this corner of great Victoria Street and Grosvenor road nicely. This derelict little corner of urban decay had lain vacant for years before being used as a very profitable car park. But once the Opera House extension was up, it didn’t take long for the remaining gap to be filled by the handsome Fitzwilliam.
The entrances into the place — there are two that pose a bit of an orientation problem: one on Great Victoria Street, which looks and feels like an after-thought; and the large revolving doors of the main entrance on Grosvenor Road — lead into a pleasant, high-ceilinged and bright reception area.
All tastefully modern, the place comes alive thanks to excellent staff who are quick to make the most disorientated new arrival feel welcome and at ease.
The restaurant is on the first floor and the straight-lined modernism carries on through from downstairs. But here, in the dining room, the feel is much more modern in a Cartoon Network way, as if somehow the set of the Incredibles or Dexter’s Laboratory have been transformed into three dimensions and reconstructed right here in Belfast.
Skinny, high-backed chairs upholstered in coarsely woven red tweed are beautifully sculptural and comfortable. Their curves provide a welcome break from the otherwise right angles of the blond wood tables and the rigidity of the place settings, where a minimal use of linen is used to good effect. It is attractive but oddly lifeless.
The lighting is soft and clever yet fails to promote a sense of warmth or comfort. That warmth comes from the staff who, just like their colleagues downstairs, are marvellously chatty, polished and friendly without being overbearing. We had one of the best waiters, Sam, who had been at Deane’s for seven years previously.
The menu confirmed all my fears, however, that we had entered a place designed for high-level corporate business. This might have been completely acceptable to Dublin’s business classes three or four years ago, but now seems anachronistic if not a bit embarrassing. There is something not quite right about this confident opulence, as if, too late to tone the place down to match the new spirit of spartan austerity, the developers just thought, ‘what the heck, lets push on and hope for the best’.
Starters at £8, main courses up to £23 and desserts not much under £7, and no sign of a set menu, are a bit last century. But this isn’t fair on those who work there because what they create is very good. It’s just that I wouldn’t want to spend my own money on it.
Nonetheless, the terrine of braised bacon and cabbage was generous and tasty. Its moist oiliness offset very nicely by a shallot vinaigrette and a particularly creamy leek puree, this was a mighty starter. Yet there was something slightly missing from this. Perhaps the price had raised expectations to ‘stun’ mode but the dish had only managed to reach the ‘that’s nice’ setting.
The adviser, who was profoundly suspicious about the place, had smoked salmon with dill sauce that she declared to be the best she’d ever had. She rarely has smoked salmon out of the house — why bother, when you can get the best from Walter Ewing’s shop on the Shankill Road and just bring it home? But this was exceptional, she felt. A quick dip into the sauce revealed a very deep and wonderfully dry aftertaste that was well partnered to the lightly smoked, thin-cut and tender salmon.
Cod and champ (described disgracefully here as “spring onion mash” as if there were something to be ashamed of the dish that made this nation great) was perfectly executed. In fact, the cod was so fine I could get that hint of very slight mix of sweetness and bitterness that defines cod from its cheaper white-fish neighbours. The spoonful of champ — which was seriously good, all buttery and packed with fine-chopped scallions — was mean in portion but very big on impact. Three spoonfuls of the stuff would have been adequate.
The adviser’s chicken with tagliatelle in lemongrass and lime sauce sounded like an Italian crashing a car in Thailand, but turned out to be zesty and a good lunchtime dish. A tiny backtaste of ginger in the pasta helped make the dish exotic. Just the thing for a wealthy corporate lawyer before heading back to the office with a clear head and a deskload of deals — five years ago.
When I asked for a recommendation for dessert I was told to go for the Bourbon vanilla crème brûlée. At £7, it ought to be spectacular, I thought. It wasn’t. It was decent and well cooked, but the vanilla was underwhelming and I’ve had better for half the price in other places. It’s a cheap dish to make. If you want to tart it up into something expensive you need some fancy additional ingredient, but you still have to get the thin crust right and the crème within just on the solid side of smooth custard, with a good vanilla kick. But that’s all it was, without the fancy bits.
A trip to the Fitzwilliam restaurant is like a visit to the museum of time where you set the clock back to 2004 and pretend to large it up like they used to before the hedge funders cleaned us all out. The corporate slickness surely makes it a very good place to stay and eat in while on a business trip, but just make sure you have an expense account or that someone else is paying.
The Bill
Sparkling water X 2 bottles: £10.20
Smoked salmon: £7
Bacon and cabbage terrine: £8
Cod fillet: £14.50
Chicken tagliatelle: £17.50
Salad: £3.50
Chips: £3.50
Crème brûlée: £6.95
Coffees X 2: £4.40
Total: £76.55
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I've seen a suite, mid and basic room and the green accent in the rooms looks great but they all look the same and I was disappointed. I have also looked in the restaurant which the reviewer very accurately described it as cartoon network, excellent description! Oh and the booths in the bar...you need to be size zero to fit into them. The food was good but the whole place has no atmoshpere, excellent staff tho. They wont budge on the price of the rooms. Do they want customers? Malmaison rules!
Posted by Jeff | 14.05.09, 18:54 GMT