“Where does Nigel recommend we go for dinner?” is a phrase that strikes fear into my heart. It is almost impossible to get that one right. If you are going somewhere new, you are trusting that the food, service, wine, price, ambience, everything is superb, and if it’s somewhere you’ve been before (and presumably liked) you run exactly the same risk. And it’s made worse when the very people asking you that enjoyed the last meal you had with them, took friends back, and had a less than satisfactory experience: Not got my star power, clearly.

It was in the middle of the longest heatwave since the Big Bang (geological, not City), and sitting inside seemed both attractive (if air conditioned) and not (we may not see sun again for many summers to come). And my friends, love them as I do, don’t always like the same Middle Easterny stuff that we do (My review of the Ox and Finch prompted a “great review, but I couldn’t have eaten any of it”), so I was paralysed.

Waterloo: Couldn’t Escape If I Wanted To

Fortunately, I was saved by geography. We all had to take a train home from Waterloo, and if you want something proximate, your options, since RSJ became Sticky Mango, are few, although my Nando’s-loving offspring might disagree. I alighted on the OXO Tower as somewhere that had it all, a solid food menu, decent wine, air conditioning and sun, both at the same time, with a view to die for. What could possibly go wrong?

Now, this is not the first time I have reviewed the OXO Tower Brasserie (I am far too much of a cheapskate to suggest going to the Restaurant). Last time, we went for an excellent set lunch, sitting over the Thames on the balcony, and the whole experience was gorgeous and reasonably priced. This being a Saturday, no set menu, of course, but not a badly priced à la carte, and it is probably the only indoor restaurant in London where you have to wear shades for half of the meal.

Six Reds, Six Rejections

Our waiter was charming (more on him later). And very understanding. I kicked off with a Negroni (obvs), which was slightly misleading as to the quality of the overall meal, but a worthwhile choice. The ladies (because they most definitely are), had champagne. And my friend, let’s call him M, had about a dozen glasses of red wine.

Ok, so that may be a slight exaggeration, but M does love his wine so very, very much, and knows a lot about it, which is the kiss of death on 95% of all restaurants in this country. He sampled all of the red wines by the glass: And sent all of them back. I had a small sip of many of them, and I had to agree with him. Not sure if Harvey Nicks wine is really that bad, or if we were suffering from the heat. The waiter, bless him, was totally unfazed, shuttling back and forth to the bar with yet another selection of wines to be promptly rejected. Finally, he staked his reputation (and tip) on choosing a bottle of wine from further up the list, which he felt would meet all of M’s requirements. And it did, twice, which was great news.

The 36-Page Wine List They Never Showed Us

Now, because I forgot what the wine was, and had hoped to highlight it, I went back to find the wine list online. I hadn’t photographed the actual list we were presented with (which was fairly short), so imagine my surprise when I found that the *actual* wine list is 36 pages long and has *15* red wines by the glass, 9 of them from the Coravin. The pleb selection on the Brasserie menu only had the remaining 6. I’m taking M off the mailing list for this review, as I am worried he is going to go back and nail the sommelier (who must have been off that night, or too posh to come into the Brasserie) to the bar. I’m going to buy M a badge for when we go out for dinner which says “Bring me the full wine list, or the puppy gets it”, to get the point across.

A Zucchini Doesn’t Blossom, and Other Disappointments

That settled, we moved on to food.

I love courgette flowers, and it was the time of year for them. Not at the OXO Tower, it wasn’t. Technically, maybe what I was given was a stuffed zucchini blossom, but it was almost completely cold, apart from one tiny portion which removed skin from the inside of my mouth. Please tell me they were fresh and not microwaved.

M had some sort of skewer which he wasn’t overly keen on, but the ladies (as they continued to be) had some absolutely delicious sardines, which really made me regret my own starter.

The (Mis)steak, and Nine Pounds of Frozen Chips

To follow, some cod, perfectly serviceable, but I challenge the assertion that the sauce had been anywhere near a langoustine, salmon, which was well-cooked but very plain, and a selection of salad, chips and veg. The salad was actually very good, but the chips were the low-grade frozen catering sort and an insult at 9 quid, but not as much as the broccoli which was rather wet and uninspiring and 8 pounds. And then there was the (mis)steak.

If you go for dinner at M’s house, you will often be served (alongside some very good red wine) a beautifully cooked piece of steak. For many years, before I discovered the Negroni, I used to judge a restaurant by the quality of its calf’s liver, which almost never turned out well. I fear M has updated this approach, and adopted steak as his measure, because it is frequent that he orders it, and infrequent that he enjoys it. And tonight was no exception. And if you look at the menu, you will see that this is no cheap cut (well, not cheap to get off the menu: It could easily have been shipped in from Tesco).

Microscopic Cheese, and an Accent 6,000 Miles Out

We topped the evening off with me complaining about cheese. It was actually quite a tasty selection, but in portions so microscopic that I could not have shared it had I wanted to (I didn’t want).

Throughout, the waiter had been a great sport, and whether it was the second bottle of wine or just the convivial atmosphere, we ended up chatting to him for a while, spending much of the time trying to place his accent. I was about 6,000 miles out. One of the ladies (still, even at this late stage), eventually rattled off enough Baltic states that we alighted upon it. I bet he wished he were back there.

The Verdict: Eat Yourself Happy

The evening ended, and after this write-up you might wonder at my title “Reprise? Yes Please”. Do I not know what reprise means, and have perhaps mistaken it for something more sinister like “reprisal”? Actually, no, and this experience gave me pause to think about what a restaurant is actually about. For me, most of the time, having excellent food is at the heart of why I go out, to eat something I could not cook for myself at home.

But it is also about the company, and the atmosphere and the feel of the evening. No, the food was not great, and the wine so-so and the bill, in the end, not that cheap (and thanks M for picking up the tab!). But we had an amazing time, watching the sun go down over London, looking at the river, and talking utter bollocks for many more hours than the staff looked happy about. Which means the Negroni had not lied to me after all, it had simply answered a different question to the one I thought I was asking it, and it also means that the people who started all this off by asking where Nigel recommends they go for dinner will go home remembering the sunset and the talking rubbish rather than the broccoli, so it seems I have got away with it once again. So this is a place to go to eat yourself happy. It’s the second time I’ve done so, and I very much intend to do so again: When the set menu is on!

Conclusion

• Overall Rating: 4/5
• Food: 3.5/5
• Drinks: 4/5 (eventually)
• Service: 4.5/5 (half off for not bringing the full wine list)
• Ambience: 5/5
• Negroni: 4/5
• Value for money: 3/5
• Price: £££
• Would we go back? See above

OXO Tower Brasserie: https://oxotowerrestaurant.com/brasserie/