Restaurants

The glass wall frontage brings a touch of metropolitan modernism to this old-school street, and the cavernous space remains a temple to hard-edged simplicity. The Avenue’s whiteness is broken only by a touch of colour from red banquettes and the bottles behind the long bar; even the pictures on the walls share a muted palette. Waiting staff, smartly attired in white shirts and long black aprons, are well-drilled, and the white-clothed tables are well-spaced, so business can be done. Prices aren’t as scary as the St James’s location might suggest, and the menu has more than a little ‘brasserie’ about it. Smoked duck and foie gras salad was an assembly of good ingredients and complementary textures, with chicory, watercress and walnut dressing. Main courses can be as robust as barnsley chop with fresh pea and broad bean purée, or as distinguished as gilthead bream, with good crisp skin, moist and tender flesh, and a tarragon-heavy herb nage; the accompanying jerusalem artichokes, however, would have been declared too firm by the Crown Prince of Al Dente himself. Desserts are a European tour, from bramleys and coxes in a crumble to crème brûlée.

Time Out Eating & Drinking Guide 2009