The Cinnamon Club is an Indian Restaurant. The building was previously the Westminster public library which creates a distinctive decor and the books are neatly grouped by colour and size and style on shelves
around the walls of the restaurant which is on the ground floor as well as along an attractive narrow overhead gallery. The gallery reminded me of the library in the home of Benjamin Disraeli, the Prime Minister in the era of Queen Victoria.
The entrance is very subtle and hidden. We walked straight passed it, until satnav sent us back retracing our steps.
Inside you are greeted at a reception desk. If you are one of a group and arrive first, the hall has a waiting area with a sofa and newspapers. A display cabinet shows three books by the chef. Reception will take your coat and hide it away discreetly out of sight.
I was treated to a family dinner. Other people in my family had found the restaurant because they were members of a club which met at Indian restaurants. I had heard it was a favourite haunt of MPs and had hoped to see somebody famous. However the restaurant is huge, plenty of room for somebody to be discreetly hidden away. The place is even larger than the main restaurant, with at least two separate ground floor areas, plus two bars, a basement level bar and enough room upstairs to hold a wedding party.
No wonder I was not colliding with the royalty and heads of state in the hallway. it wasn't just a small room with crushed together tables over a pub. The opposite. Tables so widely spaced I never heard another voice. Besides, when I went there, parliament was in recession. We did however enjoy seeing the wedding party, of which more later.
Free Cocktail
Our set meal offer cost £38 per person plus 12 and a half per cent service charge and consisted of a three course meal, an aperitif (cocktail) to start for each person and a free copy of a cookbook for each table. (Other drinks such as wines, bottled water and coffee cost extra.)
This is a free pre-starter taste, compliments of the chef.
Starter
I notice from my photo that we had a marble top table with no tablecloth. I do remember the white cloth napkins.
Main course
My main course was chicken. Another was a spicy Madras curry. The third was the rich with coconut rice. All were good but my favourite was the coconut rice.
Dessert
Desserts were all delightful. One other person had the chocolate fondant. I remember from one of my blog posts on French that fondant means melting.
The chocolate dessert with a surprise middle amused the person who ordered it.
Coffee
No coffee list was produced. This irritated me and nearly caused a divorce as I asked for it repeatedly and my other half wanted me to desist.
The waiter said, 'I can get you anything you want.' But I could not remember what I wanted. He went through a list of suggestions. I wanted the menu. I wanted the price list - which is a legal requirement.
Maybe an Irish coffee would have been a ridiculous price and an unnecessary extravagance. Maybe there was a suggested liqueur by the glass, say a muscat I would have loved, but because I didn't see the menu I didn't think of it. I had to rack my brains to think of what I really wanted - which was something I could not get in Costa or Starbucks or at home from my own Nespresso machine. it suddenly occurred to me that I would like a speciality tea, such as mint tea. Maybe there was an Indian speciality. If so, I never had the opportunity to try it.
Mint tea
Not a very strong flavour.
But the glass jug had an intriguing device in the spout. We decided it was to stop the leaves clogging up the spout.
I would also have loved a lassi, or a drink with rose water or ginger.
Never mind. I go to new and expensive places for a treat to get new experiences.
Finally chocolates. White chocolates. Good. Keeps my teeth white. Indian flavour.
Portions Perfect
Portions were perfectly sized. They did not look small, nor ridiculously large. We did not go home hungry, nor too stuffed to walk.
However, we were too tired from the cocktail which was short and overly alcoholic. Served without any nibbles as a starter drink, despite my drinking water. The drink was served like Babycham in a wide bowl which encourages you to gulp and tip too much into your mouth, because as soon as you tip it the entire contents gush out like a burst dam, rather than the hard to tip tall glasses, which get obstructed by your nose, which encourages a drip at a time and ladylike sipping.
Price
the cost of a meal for three came to £204 including twelve and a half per cent service, three 'free' cocktails, the free recipe book. We occupied our table from about 12.30 to about 4 pm, around three hours, and were not pushed out for a second sitting. When the restaurant was two thirds empty it never felt unoccupied. We could have sat against the wall at banquettes under the books.
Free taster.
Service
Service was attentive but knowledge was patchy. Some staff knew everything and others knew nothing. The keen but clueless were a puzzle, leaving me to wonder whether people were off for Xmas and agency staff had taken over. Alternatively, I wondered whether the best staff had been sent upstairs to look after the wedding party.
Some servers' actions were very good, others dire. What was good? When one of our diners left the table to go to the toilet, a waiter picked up the napkin and folded it on the table.
What was wrong? We were told the wrong ingredients of the cocktail. (Probably yesterday's cocktail.) We discovered this because our third party member arrived later and when their drink was served the waiter told us something entirely different.
When the main courses were delivered the waiters had no idea who had ordered what. As they had only three people to serve, they could have asked about only two and the last would have been obvious so at least one person could have had the correct dessert delivered. Instead of which we had a kind of rugby scrum, all pulling at one plate and the next, with the waiters also diving in, a flurry of arms and tugs of war and confusion.
What else was good? When I went out and paused near the desk somebody immediately stepped forward and asked, "Toilet, Madam?" and pointed where I should go.
Bridal Dress
I spoke to the delightful bride. She was wearing such a lovely dress it would have been a real challenge to resist congratulating her on her marriage and choice of dress. Her name was Glynne (I remember that because I have a neighbour, a man called Glynn. Her dress came from a shop in her home area of Leigh-on-Sea.
Bride's Best Friend Dress
Another guest had bought a pretty dress in Canary Wharf. The cocktail or short dress was black with a band of cutouts in the skirt. I wish I had photographed it. The whole of lower half of the skirt had square holes the shape of sugar cubes in regular formation like a checker board. You have to dress entirely in black to make this look elegant. Possibly if you feel a see through skirt showing your lower thighs is too racy, you could wear a longer underskirt or slip in a bright colour, such as fascia satin.
The old rule was that a female guest at a wedding you should not wear white to compete or distract from the bride, nor black which looks like a funeral, or makes people think you are the waitress or the dance troupe. However, that seems to have been abandoned and I had forgotten it at the time so it did not look wrong. If you have checked with the bride in advance you can be happy that your choice of colour co-ordinates with her and everybody else.
If you are having lots of wedding photos at the reception venue, it's a good idea to check their colour scheme. Even if you have chosen flowers to co-ordinate, their curtain or wall backdrop might not suit. A white or cream dress contrasts best with a darker or coloured background, and not a bright white which makes an off white dress look dirty or faded. The background should enhance the dress. if you have a professional photographer you can send them pictures of the venue.
Library Background
The dining room is books. I had chosen to wear the Christmas gifts which I had chosen for myself from the literarygifts.com I had a necklace with a red miniature book (and key too small to see in a photo), plus a brooch featuring two banned books, Howl and To Kill A Mockingbird. I felt cleverly co-ordinated with the background.
In retrospect I would have looked neater if I had chosen matching jewellery, the banned books necklace, a banned books bracelet and a banned books brooch. (What about a banned book ring?)
I was surprised that the library did not have anything on the history of the area. If you are waiting for a guest to turn up, the history of the restaurant gives you something to read whilst waiting, and something to talk about to your guest, telling them the history of the restaurant, which elevates your / the hots's air of being knowledgeable, rather than asking why are you late, which makes them obliged to exaggerate the disaster and their distress which depressed the mood.
The history of the restaurant at the back of the menu, and the history of the chef, allows you to read about them whilst appearing to read nothing other than the menu.
On the other hand, one could argue that the daily menu is sufficiently short to enable you to make a quick decision. Everybody else int he restaurant seemed to be on the special menu.
If you look on line, you will see the complete menu including Irish coffee at £10, another exotic coffee, plus assorted teas, green teas, Earl Grey, one white tea described as tasting of watermelon.
One of the
I suggest at this restaurant and any other you check online in advance to see if there are any speciality teas, coffees, cocktails and dessert wines to be sure you don't miss out. Even if you are already sufficiently inebriated (as we were) or have reached your budget limit, It's nice to know at the time that you have taken advantage of all the optional delights.
The Cinnamon Club
The Old Westminster Library
30-32 Great Smith Street
London SW1P 3BU
tel:+44 (0) 20 7222 2555
info@cinnamonclub.com
www.cinnamonclub.com
http://www.thecinnamoncollection.com/cinnamon-club/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2015/08/CC_Desserts_Menu_December-2015.pdf
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer,
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