Top Draw
In the window there’s a plaque to Green & Blacks, the deliciously ethical chocolate people who launched their first bar on this site. The Portobello Road shop has had lots of inhabitants since then though, and it opened as The Muse at 269, a gallery/bar/restaurant a few years ago, adding to its name a few times since. Now it’s subtitled the Drawing Room, an all-white space with fancy candelabra, chill out music and a mix of strange conceptual art and grim photographs on the walls.
Everyone knows it’s not the best moment for restaurants in general, and the Drawing Room feels a touch recession-struck, but it offers high class food with friendly and charming service, and the central bar attracts a regular crowd. To start, we had a smoked mackerel and potato salad with horseradish and watercress that was sharp and tasty, plus a good plate of cured Spanish meats.
My main course of scallops and tiger prawns with celeriac puree and saffron sauce was creamy and generous, and organic skewered lamb with aubergine caviar came, surprisingly, breaded, which was a big success. In honour of Green & Blacks, we went for chocolate fondant puddings which were flawlessly made, intense and deliciously soft inside. High marks to the kitchen, and to the loo for containing, like all the best addresses in west London, a collection of old copies of The Hill.