With the restaurant smelling of mulled wine and festooned in pretty lights, we can’t wait to try one of the ‘Jolly Robin’ menu’s festive cocktails. The Red Robin leads the way with Maker’s Mark Bourbon mixed with lemon, pomegranate and honey and finished with apple cider, and the Christmas Star is Roku Japanese Gin, star anise, pineapple, lemon & Crème de Mûre. Tempted as we are by the Hogmanay Hot Chocolate, a decadent winter warmer with Highland Park 12 Year Old Scotch, chocolate, cream and finished with torched marshmallow, we have come in for dinner! This one will keep as a winter pick-me-up after some sale shopping on our next visit.
Speaking of food, we enjoy the busy, buzzy Christmas vibe in the air while we peruse the menu. With so many mouth-watering dishes to choose from it’s not easy. There are the Ivy classics to safely fall back on (including some with a festive twist like a goose shepherd’s pie) and we both pick the truffled wild mushrooms to start with. Potato rösti, creamed mushroom, fried quail’s egg and grated truffle, it’s tasty and substantial. For our main course we opt for pan fried lemon sole and it’s delicately presented and gently flavoured with beurre noisette, lemon and capers. Soft and succulent it makes a perfect dish to accompany the truffle chips which were impossible to resist – a posh fish and chips really! We also opt for a happy twist on the classic fillet steak; a perfectly cooked, meltingly tender grilled fillet with braised beef ravioli, creamed spinach and chestnut red wine sauce.
We are, unsurprisingly, too full up for dessert, but do manage coffee and some chocolate truffles to finish. Feeling festive and content it’s a struggle to leave such a cosy place to make our chilly way home, but leave we must, already discussing when we can make a return visit.
1 Granary Square, Kings Cross, N1C 4AB (granarysquarebrasserie.com)