Is this the end of the ice bucket? Mike goes iceless at Restaurant Story.
He has brought along several of the table height rectangular pedestals in each of the four options of dark or light wood, or gloss black or white. He used military and medical tech to create heavier cold air convection currents which stay in the bottle holder keeping your booze at the perfect temperature.
We mingle and enjoy snacks of squid ink biscuits and Nasturtium flowers as our host for the event,’wine chap’ Tom Harrow introduces us to the Armand de Brignac Brut Rose Champagne. The excellent waiting staff remove the distinctive pink bottle poking out of the mirror-polished stainless steel ringed LED lit opening in each Kaelo’s top and serve.
We take our seats at solid timber tables in the restaurant’s stone and wood clad interior. It’s a contemporary building designed by reForm architects with vertical slatted exterior cladding and a large glazed façade facing the small adjacent gardens.
It was built on the site of a former public convenience but people now sit for rather longer as they enjoy Chef Patron Tom Sellers ever-evolving tasting menu of seasonal dishes, the’Full Story’ of a’foreword’ and five’chapters’ taking up to four hours to peruse. Tom studied with Tom Aikens, Noma and Per Se before opening Restaurant Story aged only 26. It gained its Michelin star five months after opening and has retained it ever since.
I chat to a restaurant and beverage consultant at our table (who shall remain anonymous) and he points out how cheap to produce this theatrical starter is -and how it’s likely they filter and reform the melted fat to recycle it for the next service too. With the set menu dinner here costing £120 per head, he has a point.
Scallop, cucumber and ash follow, paired with a Rum Diary cocktail. Bisected into three thin discs, the scallop is delicious, as is the triple distilled fragrant cocktail. My restaurant insider tells the story of his friend who enjoyed the full four hour tasting menu here but after several beautiful but slight’chapters’ felt compelled to add the’epilogue’ of a kebab on the way home.
I can definitely see a niche market for dry cooling of your tipple instead of a dripping ice bucket, but I’m going to have to bust some phat-bangin’ rhymes to hustle serious’G’ as a Hip Hop playa to be able to afford one – Fo’ shizzle*.
* mic drop
Find out more about the Kaelo Wine Bucket at www.kaelo.co.uk/