Jason G.
Yelp
My partner and my friend and I went to Corrigan's rather at the spur of the moment while we were walking around London. It was a Sunday night, so they had availability and we popped in. My partner had read about it online as one of the best new restaurants in London, so we decided to give it a try. Overall, I feel that it somewhat failed at being truly great while still providing some delicious offerings.
Even before I start the review, I will say that I'm rating Corrigan's three stars not because it is an average "A-OK" restaurant among the totality of restaurants in London, but rather I'm judging it based on what it is trying to be, basically a Michelin one-star restaurant. And with that criteria in mind, I would say it is not worthy of a Michelin star and has some specific points of failure in regard to that.
The welcome was cordial, and I personally really liked the atmosphere. It was not too stuffy for an establishment like this, with lots of lights and darker colors. I do think that people are seated very close together at this restaurant, which is not a romantic setting, that's for sure.
The sommelier here was French and very stuffy. The wine list at this restaurant is not very approachable, with most over £100. I personally felt that she came off as haughty when my partner said that a £155 bottle was not in the price range he was looking for. He finally settled on a glass of wine, but he instead order a carafe of two glasses. When they only brought a glass of wine out with his entrée, he told them that he actually ordered a carafe. So they dutifully brought him a carafe, but them proceed to charge him for all three glasses. That was a mistake of the server, with one hand not knowing what the other hand was doing with regard to their customers. I was not a fan of the sommelier, and then halfway through dinner, she apologized for being a bit gruff because she said she was having a bad day. When someone at a restaurant like this apologizes unsolicitously, you know it must've been bad. The cocktail list was equally unimaginative. They had one or two original cocktails, but that's it. What's the point of having a "cocktail list" if I can have a drink or a cocktail that people would order by name anyway?
The food itself was very hit-or-miss. I ordered the crab linguine, which I really liked. My friend had the whole Dover sole bone-in, and it was absolutely fantastic. Crispy on top and the bone came out very easily. The fish was cooked perfectly, and there were absolutely no faults with dish. For £35, that's a very good option. On the other hand, the dish I ordered for was a complete failure. They had a special of wood pigeon with foie gras, and because we just been in the countryside, I ordered that to see what it tasted like. The plating and presentation was a bit messy, since the components were basically all the thing color - dark brown. There was a generous portion of foie gras on a crostini, and of course that was delicious. However, once I started eating the portion of wood pigeon, I found out one ...not two ...but three shot pellets in the pigeon. One is a bad but acceptable, two is pretty bad, and with three, I just sent the dish back half-eaten. Not being able to bite down on your food for fear of biting down on shot is not appetizing and not good. The manager came around to apologize for the mishap, and offered to get me another entrée. This point, two hours into the meal, I didn't want to have to wait another 30 minutes to cook a fish entrée. I just told him we would have the cheese course and it would be fine. I will say that the cheese course was delicious.
I will say that when someone has to send the dish back because it legitimately was inedible, you go out of your way to take care of that patron. After cheese was served, we literally were deserted. We wanted some port with my cheese, but we never saw a menu and I'm not going to constantly be flagging a server down. Now, I'm not talking about getting free stuff because of their mistake, I'm more talking about offering drinks with cheese, which is not some crazy notion. I think this is where I would give the lowest marks to this restaurant. They were not understaffed or anything, because they were only four tables that were being served. You could see them trying, but it it just not up to snuff compared with real Michelin-starred restaurants. So while I would probably give the food 3.4 or so, they would get under three stars for service throughout the course of the meal. Maybe that is just the British way of service, I do not know, but for my American sensibilities, it was not good.
For its price point, I don't think that I would recommend Corrigan's. There are a lot of new and expensive restaurants to try in London, but I don't think this should be on your list. Don't get me wrong, they have some really good food and the sole was amazing, but other than that, there was nothing special or memorable.