The Palm Restaurant

A midweek dinner with some good friends led us in search of steak. We were 3 guys, what else were we gong to eat? London steakhouses are experiencing a bit of a Renaissance right now, so this place has stiff competition. I personally haven't been to either Goodman's or The Hawksmoor which are surely arch rivals, but one of our group had and he felt this place serves the best steak in London. Oh yes. Bring it on.

Its based in Knightsbridge not far from the station in amongst expectedly opulent surroundings. I arrived early alone and was seated at the bar whilst I waited for my friends. It looked like a serious bar, but I settled for a beer to ease myself into the evening. The first thing that struck me whilst waiting was the type of people here. Overwhelmingly male, hedge fund, alpha males type guys talking overly loud. Never mind, we were here for the food.

We ordered a portion of calamari to start and shared this. Most of the dishes are "family style" and this dish easily fed the three of us (£10.50). The opening gambit wasn't overly impressive to be honest. It lacked a fresh, just fried crispness and a lemon/acid hit you need with fried seafood.

For my steak, I ordered the 16 ounce Prime Aged New York Strip (£42 approx). OK, I admit, this place stepped up its game seriously here. I could smell how good the meat was as the vapour wafted up from my plate. Beefy, meaty, delightful. The steak was medium as ordered and incredibly juicy in the middle with the salty, beefy char on the outside they know you want.

We ordered some sides to share. Chips, creamed spinach and wild mushrooms (these were excellent). All sides are £10 something each. Not cheap but they are big.



This place does a serious steak. By far the best one I have ever had. Forget about Gaucho this place is where hardcore steak lovers should come. I am keen to compare it to the Hawksmoor but I can't see steaks getting much better than this. Its not cheap, and we spent £85 each for a 3 courses plus £40 bottle of wine. I place for a celebratory dinner I would say, like the fact that it's a Monday.

Monster Munch Rating: 88%

The Palm Restaurant
1 - 3 Pont Street
London
SW1X 9EJ
0207 201 0710

www.thepalm.com

Wild Garlic

I have wanted to try wild garlic for ages. I've seen it a few times on TV shows and the chefs always get extremely excited about it. Intrigue and curiosity aroused. We are incredibly lucky to have a local farmer's market very close to our house and I snapped at the opportunity to buy some Wild Garlic (also called ramsons) and try cooking with it.

Apparently they are only available for a short period of time, in the spring. This probably helps to explain some of the excitement chefs and foodies get from cooking with them. I also hear they grow very abundantly in deciduous woodland if you fancy foraging for some a la Hugh Fernley.



I got a big bunch from the market and hurridly took them home. The leaves were long and green and the first thing that struck me was how strongly of garlic they smell. Insane. I wasn't too sure what to do with them. Most recipes I have seen use them for soup. I have also seen a wild garlic pesto (use ramsons in place of basil) being done.

Since it was my first time using them, I kept it simple and went for a soup.

I sweated onion and the wild garlic in butter, added cubed potato and chicken stock and then blitzed.

Not bad for a first attempt. If I were doing it again I would definitely whizz the wild garlic into a pesto kind of paste and then sweat this in butter, maybe with leeks and onion. I would also add more potato as I prefer my soup thicker.

We experimented a bit more with the rest of the wild garlic, using it to flavour fish steamed "en papillote" and also in a potato salad at a BBQ (this was great). I recommend you go buy (or pick!) some.