If they gave out Michelin Stars for sheer grandeur, then the Midland Grand Dining Room would be on first-name terms with the inspectors.
And now that wonderful space is getting a chef who actually does have a very real, cooking-and-everything, actual Michelin Star. Victor Garvey won the accolade at his Soho restaurant SO|LA, and now he’s taking on one of the city’s most stunning venues.
To do it, he’s teamed up with developer and hotelier Harry Handelsman, the man who turned The Chiltern Firehouse into the place where even celebrities have to name-drop to get a table. Basically, he understands how to turn a restaurant into the restaurant. He was also the one who oversaw the reopening of the space in 2023 with chef Patrick Powell at the helm – but Powell has since decided to take a step back. Thus, a new chef, a new menu, and a new concept.
Michael Sinclair
When it comes to the space of course, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it, and this magnificent dining room hasn’t been broke since it first opened in 1873. It occupies, without exaggeration, one of the most architecturally stunning settings in the city. Triple-height moulded ceilings with vast chandeliers hang over the space. There are slender windows soaring to the ceiling, with views of the hotel’s iconic clock tower. There’s a lot to work with, architecturally, but they’ve stopped the place feeling draughty and austere with warm copper walls, sumptuous chenille armchairs and banquettes, and cabaret lamps on every table, casting a speckled glow across the room. They could serve a tin of baked beans in here, and it would probably feel like the most luxurious meal you’d ever had.
But that is not the plan.
No, Victor Garvey is going to be reinventing the kitchen, and he’s doing it with a menu that pays homage to the great traditions of French cooking while embracing modern techniques and the top-shelf ingredients. Signature dishes will include L’Homard – a luxuriously butter-poached lobster, finished tableside with a pressed lobster jus for maximum depth of flavour. Then there’s the Tauzin Guinea Fowl “Demi-Deuil”—a rich and decadent dish where guinea fowl is stuffed under the skin with truffled leg mousse and served with a rich jus. It’s about as decadently French as it gets.
The tasting menus come in two tiers, the Menu Expérience, which is basically a love letter to indulgence. We’re talking 7 courses including Kindai bluefin tuna with white peach & tender almond; native lobster partnered up with piquillo, physalis, and osmanthus; Mieral duck with boudin noir & Calvados apples, and a dessert of chocolate crémeux with crème fraîche & stem ginger tying it all together. If you have the space, you can upgrade to the 12-course Menu Gourmandise, too.
Basically, the Midland Grand Dining Room has always looked like a place where something spectacular should be happening. And now, with Victor Garvey at the helm, it absolutely will be.
NOTE: Victor Garvey at The Midland Grand Dining Room will open early March. You might also like to enjoy a pre- or post-dinner cocktail at Gothic Bar next to the restaurant. Find out more at the restaurant website.
PREVIOUS PERK: Nudge Members (+1) got 50% off the Menu Expérience tasting menu on the evenings of the 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th & 8th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, & 15th March.
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Victor Garvey at The Midland Grand Dining Room | St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel, Euston Road, London NW1 2AR
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