Rivington Bar and Grill
Telephone: 020-7729 7053
Address: 28-30 Rivington Street, London EC2
Rating: 14/20
· Open Mon-Fri, lunch, 12 noon-3.30pm, dinner, 6.30-10.30pm; Sat, dinner only 6.30-10.30pm; Sun, brunch, 12 noon-4.30pm; 6.30-10.30pm
Chez Max
Telephone: 020-7590 9999
Address: 3 Yeoman's Row, London SW3
Rating: 16/20
· Open all week, 12 noon-3pm; 6-11pm
We live in retro times. After years of haute French, fusion fuss and smooth Italians, bourgeois French is making a strong showing in the lists of the capital's eateries. There is Racine, opened last year, next door to the revived Grill St Quentin, and Conran's Almeida, La Trouvaille and, oooh, several more besides.
The latest to show up in the centre of the city is Chez Max, which, under the benevolent aegis of Max Renzland, patron and guiding spirit, has decamped from the leafy suburbs to the south-west of town and taken over the site of what was once the Parisienne Chop House, a satellite of the Marco Pierre White empire.
However, la cuisine bourgeois is not the only retro show in town. By a strange quirk of timing, the Rivington Bar and Grill, a restaurant serving the British equivalent - that is, traditional home cooking - has opened in EC2. Both have much to recommend them, and they make an interesting contrast in style and comestibles.
Most of the décor and fixtures of the vanished Parisienne Chop House are still present in Chez Max - the booths, the chequerboard flooring, the posters, the oxblood lights. It is a very fair pastiche of a true brasserie, a resemblance that is heightened by the French waiters, classically kitted out, and the presence of Renzland himself, a man who looks comfortable inside his not inconsiderable tum, and who marshals staff and customers with skill and kindly firmness.
The Rivington Bar and Grill is the opposite of this in almost every way. It is clean, stark and modern. It has the obligatory wood floor and white walls of today's vogueish, fogey-ish eatery. It smacks of smart meritocracy, of youth and of disposable income. It has no Max Renzland to put the imprimatur of the patron on the place, but it has efficient, bustling waitresses of much charm. The Rivington Bar and Grill speaks for new Britain as eloquently as Chez Max speaks for old France.
But how do you rate devilled lambs' kidneys or poached egg with buttered sea kale at the former against smoked herring fillets with potato salad or Antillaise black pudding with potato purée, onions and mustard sauce at the latter? Or, indeed, the Rivington's hamburger and chips or Barnsley chop and bubble and squeak against Chez Max's braised lamb persillé with haricots flageolet, spinach, roast garlic and jus or saucisse de Morteau artisanale grillés, Savoy cabbage, purée and Dijon mustard sauce (the Chez Max menu is an endearing mix of the two languages).
I suppose you can't, really. Dishes of this kind have an irresistible siren call to my tastebuds and sense of noshtalgia. These are the foods I grew up with, foods I learned to salivate over at my granny's knee. And when they are pulled off with attention to detail - perfect pink kidneys singing in a rich sauce made bouncy with mustard and Worcestershire sauce; the slight bitterness of crisp sea kale, that rarest and most delicate of British vegetables, swathed in egg yolk and melted butter; taut, tense herring with firm potatoes glistening in peanut oil; and refined, downy, black pudding with fleecy mash - well, I would happily eat them every day from here to eternity.
When it came to main courses, Chez Max began to put some distance between itself and the Rivington Bar and Grill. The cause of the latter was not helped by some very pedestrian chips, although the hamburger which they accompanied verged on the excellent. The Barnsley chop was a plain and perfectly fine piece of meat, but there was nothing exceptional about its pedigree.
The sad fact is that, wholesome and pleasing though such dishes may be, they are simply no match for a bit of braised shoulder of lamb persillé or a mighty, meaty Morteau sausage served with all the trimmings. These French classics have an attention to detail, a sophistication to the individual elements, as well as to the cooking processes, that produces layers of flavour that their English counterparts lack, at least in the form they take at the Rivington Bar and Grill.
Even at the pudding stage, when a British restaurant really should have a clear advantage over a French one, a dreadful, over-sweet apple crumble that appeared to have been soldered to the plate simply betrayed our great heritage.
The prices are roughly comparable - £76.22 for two at the Rivington, £79.50 at Chez Max - although Chez Max does fixed-price lunches, and the Rivington does not. And the wine list at Chez Max is more highly developed, and offers wines by the 25cl and 50cl carafe, as well as by the glass.
In the end, then, you pays your money and you takes your choice - plain-speaking English against the seductive murmur of French.
