After checking in to the Mandarin Oriental around lunchtime, Mr A and I crossed Knightsbridge to the well-known Harvey Nichols department store, which is directly opposite the hotel.  Harvey Nichols is a ‘high end’ store with a customer demographic a little younger/trendier than Harrods, which is a few hundred metres away along the Brompton Road.  For several years I’d read about the good food to be had at the restaurant on the 5th floor of Harvey Nichols, and today was to be my first experience of dining there.  But because we had a reservation at a 2 Michelin star restaurant that evening, I was only planning to take a light lunch.

I hadn’t made an advanced booking, but there was no problem getting a table as a ‘walk-in’ around 2pm on a Tuesday at the start of June, when the store was less busy.  The open restaurant space is bright and very airy, and it has an outside terrace space, but when were were there it seemed the terrace was only being used for drinkers rather than diners.

With it being a warm and sunny day, and to celebrate the start of our short pandemic ‘staycation’, we ordered some bubbles to kick things off; a glass of Moet for me and a Kir Royale for Mr A (£16 each).

We each chose to have just one course. I picked roast salmon with jersey royal potatoes, carrots and crayfish, while Mr A went for a Caesar salad.  My salmon had a crispy skin, but the quality of the fish wasn’t great and I found its flavour to be a bit wishy washy. But all the other elements on the plate were very tasty.  5/10

This was intended to be a quick, light lunch, rather than a full gastronomic experience, which I was rather pleased about. I’m not sure I could have chosen a ‘gastronomic experience’ from the rather dull and unadventurous menu.  The good things I’d read about this restaurant some years earlier seem to be confined to history.  Total bill £85.13.  5/10