Telephone: 020 7408 2236
Address: 34 South Molton Street, London W1
Dinner for two, including wine and service, £102.
South Molton Street, London W1 was the Westbourne Grove and the Marylebone High Street of the 80s. Or, in other words, it was a ruinously fashionable shopping thoroughfare frequented mostly by over-18s who were less than a size 12.
I haven't had much cause to visit SMSt, since awesomely stylish boutiques dropped right off my radar around the time I hit size 14, and walking the length of it before dinner I got the feeling that the kind of bling-blinglicious babes who made it their patch 15 years ago are now hanging elsewhere. In Hoxton, probably - or, for all I know, Harrow, Highgate or Hainault.
But how wrong I am. Number 34 is a restaurant called Khew with a modish yet self-effacing frontage. On the ground level it looks like a lunchtime sushi joint, but on the cusp of dusk the action is all downstairs. Here, just past the bar, among the Naugahyde banquettes, smoky glass and bamboo screens, is a scene from Austin Powers Goes Back to the Future. It's babes-à-gogo, it's blingsville, it's beautiful girls with hair cut on the bias and groomed boys with asymmetric careers and platinum credit.
Khew does fusion, which, if one was being sniffy, was pretty big back when I was a restaurant critic in the 90s but which has now been usurped by any number of foodie microtrends. Still, Khew's chef is ex-Nobu and despite being from Staffordshire has never bothered cooking Western food for a living.
The menu is eclectic. My partner, who helps blow my cover by saying, 'Oh, I didn't realise this was one of Drew's restaurants' as he waves at the owner (formerly keeper of Montana, Dakota and Canyon), is as happy as a man who bid adieu to a social life on the day last year when his son was born could possibly be, bearing in mind he is missing the evening's football.
This is his favourite sort of food, and the ceviche of king scallop and pomelo with honey popcorn hits the spot, as does the salmon sashimi, the dim sum confit of duck and nashi pear. For me, the soft-shell crab tempura and the Lon guppy with salmon and prawn and crispy betel leaves are minor triumphs, enough to distract me monetarily from the clientele: a lovely couple to my right, singing the praises of the lamb shank Massaman and post-prandial Orient Espresso; a less lovely pair to my left: Ms Don't Hate Me Because I'm Beautiful and her fawning beau.
After we sample the pineapple and liquorice sago pud, Drew reveals that there are two empty floors upstairs, destined for drinking, dancing and lounging and which will probably attract the kind of clientele who were born in the 80s. Khew is fresh and funky, if rather pricey. Still, South Molton Street has never been cheap, and clearly it's not about to start now.
