46 • The Sunday Times Magazine
Its patrons
seem to
have found
the secret
to rude late-
middle-aged
health: red
wine and
animal fats
Rosé, Blue Nun. (I was particularly
transfixed by a menu from Butlin’s,
Boxing Day, 1964: oxtail soup,
roast lamb with roast and boiled
potatoes, “red and white wine on
the house”. Hic.) Sixty years ago,
posh food was overwhelmingly
French, often in grand hotels. It
took the Italians — notably Mario
and Franco with their hugely
influential series of informal
trats — to blow the cobwebs off
a fossilised industry.
But determination to check
out a 1960s restaurant that wasn’t
just still going but thriving led
me inexorably to a French one,
La Poule au Pot — a joint that,
with its sibling Maggie Jones,
defines a time when the look was
dust-moted, gewgaw-rammed
and “romantic”. And when west
London was totally happening,
man. Various sources report it
as opening in either 1962 or- But who’s counting? The
restaurant itself shrugs off such
details, saying only it has been
open “as long as anyone cares
to remember”.
The menu is a gorgeous time
capsule: quiche, ratatouille,
rillettes. Boeuf bourguignon,
foie de veau, coq au vin. My
challenge to myself was not to say
“comme il faut” about the pâté de
foie de volaille and French onion
soup, but, well. The former is
suave, rich and boozy (like the
clientele), served with warm
brioche toast; the soup also
hooch-laced and duly topped with
molten Gruyère-laden croûte.
What can I tell you?
There are well-dressed salads,
even if the pal whispers “baby
spinach” in the tone of voice you’d
use for “roiling maggots”. And the
frites that come with my entrecôteOur romance with this grande
dame has stood the test of time
La Poule au Pot,
231 Ebury Street,
London SW1;
020 7730 7763;
pouleaupot.co.ukMarina O’Loughlin
L
ast week this magazine
celebrated its 60th birthday,
which set me thinking about the
seismic movements in the world of
food over those decades. Because
of all the cultural and lifestyle
elements in the UK that have
changed out of all recognition
since the 1960s, how we eat has to
be right up there. And especially
how we eat in restaurants.
It sent me down a wormhole of
old joints and menus, a fascinating
world populated by sneery maîtres
d’, timorous diners, Berni Inns,
chicken Maryland, duck à l’orange,
sole Véronique, steak Diane, boeuf
stroganoff, crêpes suzette, MateusTa b l e Ta l k
La Poule au Pot
Belgravia