London Left

Just made it back home after briefly stopping off in London. Had an excuse to swing by the Frontline restaurant in Paddington once again, a place that's becoming quite a regular haunt. I mean, who could refuse the idea of fishcake and chips, followed by a Rolo-inspired chocolate pot? Well, not me for one. As before, good solid cooking, classic British dishes, first-rate ingredients.

Walking back, I came in via the Paddington station concourse and decided to grab a quick shot just to see how a new toy would work out. I recently picked up a Canon G9 and wanted to test out how it would handle low-light situations. "Not at all bad" is the answer, especially as there is clearly some blur evident on this one and hence this is far from a fair shot to be posting in answer to that question. The camera is a bit heavier and a bit larger than the normal pocket digicam I carry, but it has the singular advantage of offering a RAW capture capability and so I plan to start taking it along instead from here on in.

Frontline Club & Restaurant

Thanks to "I" for pointing me towards frontline, a media club just off Praed Street and a couple of minutes walk from Paddington station. In addition to a members room, the club has a ground-floor restaurant open to non-members.

The space they have created is light, open and modern with high ceilings and exposed brickwork over stripped hardwood floors. In addition to being the restaurant, it also serves as a venue to show iconic photojournalist shots from the past 50 years. These include St. Paul's standing alone through a circle of smoke during the blitz, that classic Eisenstaedt shot of a sailor kissing a girl in Time Square on VJ day and British Soldiers in Belfast in 1971. (More recent shots are also exhibited on the staircase to the bathrooms, taking us right up to date with pictures of the US forces in Iraq.)

Menu is classic British food but brought up to date both in terms of presentation and execution. I started with pea and ham soup which was served hot and steaming in a large, deep bowl. (No nouveau cuisine-sized portions served here. It felt more like dining in the US than a well regarded restaurant in London.) For main course I went for the pork chop served with pan haggerty (aka potatoes dauphinoise) and pork scratchings. Again, good sized portion and well cooked, though the pork was a bit bland I'd have to say the overall dish was good. Others in our party of 7 had duck breast ("excellent") and stuffed pumpkin ("very good"). Puddings covered things like sticky toffee, Queen Mab's (creamy set mousse), ice creams and an excellent cheese plate from Neal's Yard. Alas, I was well past full by that stage so can't opine on any of it but my colleagues all gave them good marks.

Price? About 450 quid including drinks (excellent wine list, too). Not bad for a party our size eating out in central London. And you can also feel good that profits from the restaurant help support the charitable effors of the Frontline Forum.

Gripes? a) they charged for the bread they brought out, albeit at 50 pence a portion. Why?? b) the waitress didn't mention the specials at all, one of which I heard about from a server at an adjoining table and I would have chosen for my main course (skate). Apart from that, everything was handled well.

Verdict: would definitely go back, and if you are in the area it's a great choice either for business or for "personal eating" (there must be a better phrase than that but my brain is still fogged by jet-lag and the after effects of the wine we managed to sink last night!) It is open all day and quite frankly it's worth visiting just for the photos, let alone the well done, well-priced food.

Room With A View

The vista in question being of one of the twin towers fronting the Paddington station terminus. I seem to have had some luck when checking-in and got a top floor room with a small balcony area outside. The picture above shows the principal view.

Room rate? North of $600 per night ... and that's by no means the most expensive hotel round here, not by a long chalk. We booked way-late and ended up with very few options. Good job the air fares were cheap because in terms of accommodation this is fast becoming a seriously pricey option. (Just to set the context, around the corner in W2, an 800 sq foot flat is listed for a little over $1m, and this is in Bayswater for heaven's sake! As BAR pointed out last week, in a more desireable area like Chelsea you can easily pay double that.)

1Q:Q2

Chromium Kiss

So, did we make the 1Q? Kind of ...

Late breaking, we got verbal agreement on a decent-sized deal right as Friday evening was closing out. We issued temporary keys to get the customer going and had them start March 30th. If the associated paperwork, to be sorted over the next couple of weeks, looks good and affirms that date then we should be OK to take this as a booking. Given that, we made plan. If we can't book it then we'll at least have come close and will have a good start on the second quarter. Time to declare victory and move on!

Time to come, time to go

Paddington station remains a wonderful testament to Victorian architecture and engineering. Built by one of England's greatest engineers of all time, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, it's soaring roof, broad span and cathedral-like proportions never cease to amaze, especially given the necessary innovation in the structural use of cast iron required in order for his vision to be realised. To quote from the man himself (and thanks to http://www.greatbuildings.com/ for this bit.)

"I am going to design... a Station after my own fancy; that is, with engineering roofs, etc. ... such a thing will be entirely metal as to all the general forms ... ; it almost of necessity becomes an Engineering Work, but, to be honest, even it if were not, it is a branch of architecture of which I am fond, and of course, believe myself fully competent for, but for detail of ornamentation I neither have time nor knowledge ..."

(Isambard Kingdom Brunel, in a letter to Matthew Digby Wyatt inviting collaboration on the design of Paddington Station, as quoted in Randall J. Van Vunckt, ed., International Dictionary of Architects and Architecture: Volume 1, Architects. Detroit: St. James Press, 1993.)

The - relatively - new Paddington Express from Heathrow to London goes into this station but I'll swear that 99% of travellers never even look up as they move from train to Tube. They miss so much; it's almost criminal in my book how little attention this gateway to London and London's past gets from those who use it. When it was built in the middle of the 19th century, this place epitomised all that London had been, was and would become. The power of Britain as the extant only world superpower at that time made manifest, all in a single monument.