Telephone: 01764 694267
Address: Gleneagles Hotel, Auchterarder, Perthshire
Rating: 18/20
Gleneagles is big. Big as in mighty, majestic, monumental and mammoth. Through the heavy-gravity portals we went, Foxtrot and I, across the hall that would reduce a monarch to humility, along corridors the size of dual carriageways, nodding respectfully at smiling functionaries as we went. At last we came to that corner of the Gleneagles Hotel that is Andrew Fairlie's. I had worked up quite an appetite by this time.
Not that long ago, Fairlie was the king of One Devonshire Gardens, where he was feted and starred. He moved to Gleneagles about two years ago, to turn one corner of that Brobdingnagian palace into his own kingdom. Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles has the same relationship to the hotel as San Marino does to Italy. It is an independent state within the larger host. And it would seem to be a state run by a benign dictator. The staff are delightful, and go about their business with unobtrusive enthusiasm. There is a cheerful harmony between kitchen and waiting staff.
This is not only pleasant in itself, but also helps to animate the dining room, in which the formal grandeur of the rest of the building - ceiling disappearing into the clouds, neo-classical pillars, rich moulding and cornicing - is offset by an austere colour scheme: white ceiling, mouldings and pillars, with steely blue-black walls that one of the waiters described accurately as the colour of uncooked lobster. The overall effect was rather good, I thought, grand but not grandiose. Foxtrot said that it was manly, and I think that's about right.
It is the kind of place that you know is not going to come cheap, so let's deal with that issue right away. The menu is set at £55 for three courses, not including service or wine - and wine, as we know, can be very expensive. At Andrew Fairlie it is very expensive indeed. There's nothing available for less than £20 a bottle. That said, the list is beautifully balanced, interesting and intelligent, and there are a substantial number of wines by the glass. But no matter how restrained you may be, the bill is going to be £150 or so for two. If you can't face that kind of damage, don't go to Andrew Fairlie. I will think none the worse of you. But I will think you're making a big mistake. This fellow can cook.
He cooks with immense intelligence, with delicacy and refinement, with head as well as heart. His food isn't marked by extremes, novelty or imaginative extravagance. It is classic and French in technique and tenor, structure and saucing, but it has a distinctive, precise character that comes from balance and restraint. What is the best amuse bouche I've had this year? Why, it's Fairlie's little half a new potato hollowed out and filled with a mousseline of cauliflower and Parmesan. The heart comes into the passion for ingredients, for the potato tasted more of potato than it had any right to do. The head produced a superb liaison with the cauli and cheese.
What is the finest salad I've come across this year? Why, it's Fairlie's salad of winter vegetables and leaves with beetroot dressing. Cauli, again, crosnes, salsify and chunks of carrot had been lightly pickled and mixed with lamb's lettuce, frisée, radicchio, land cress and thread-like mung bean shoots. It was fresh and earthy and soothing and sexy all at the same time, with the beetroot shading a slightly darker flavour. It takes more imagination and greater skill to make a memorable salad than it does, say, a memorable fish dish. Luckily, we had one of those, too.
While Foxtrot munched her way through that masterpiece, I made do with a Fairlie classic: smoked lobster with herb butter. In fact, only the shell was smoked, while the flesh was poached. Consequently, the smokiness was almost an aura, bringing up the incomparable sweetness of the tail-flippingly fresh Scottish crustacean. The buttery herb sauce added a smooth, heart-stopping (literally?) sense of luxury. Bread extracted the last smear from the shell. This was a sensual dish from start to finish.
I could go through each course, but we'd be here until Christmas. Even without my notes to prompt me, I can call to mind a number of shining details - the iridescent whiteness of Foxtrot's turbot; roasted salsify, among other root vegetables, with my venison; tiny shards of bacon in the Savoy cabbage, beneath thick slices of velvety meat that permeated the vegetable with rich, smoky porkiness; the ethereal lightness of Foxtrot's savarin with roasted winter fruits. It was a faultless meal in all its parts and in the sums of its parts. Dishes knitted together with seamless unity. Flavours flowed around the mouth.
Wellbeing welled up. We finished it all, every last scrap, and made our way out along the echoing corridors. And the bill was £157.80. So what?
· Open Dinner only, Mon-Sat, 6.30-10pm. Menus: £55 for three courses. All major credit cards. Wheelchair access & WC.
