#holborndiningroom

If you’ve lived in or even visited Britain, hopefully, you’ve been able to have yourself a good british pie.  There’s something about a good pie that is just so comforting and hearty.  I would’ve said it’s definitely up there as one of the great winter meals but with the weather being so upside down these last few years, seasons don’t really come into it anymore.  So when I heard that apart from one of London’s largest gin collections, the Holborn Dining Room in the Rosewood Hotel also had a pie room, we had to check it out.

We decided to have a starter of oysters and a scotch egg.  The oysters were great, nice and plump with a lovely briney-ness to them.  Lovely and fresh too! 

The scotch egg was also really impressive.  As you can see, the egg was cooked just right to that lovely gooey consistency and the sausage meat had really good flavour.  Delicious!

We also went for a British charcuterie board.  This was a bit hit and miss with some of it a little too salty even for my liking and some of it just great!  I found the darker stuff a little bit more to my taste.

Now onto the pies!  We decided to go classic and went for a steak and kidney.  Now a suet pastry isn’t for everyone but this one was done really well!  If you don’t like this version, than I think it’s safe to say that you won’t like suet pastry.  The filling and the gravy it came in was incredibly rich and just so meaty.  There were big chunks of steak and of kidney in this thing in a nice thick sauce.  I really liked this but I can understand how it might be a bit much for some.

After the super traditional of the steak and kidney, this next pie is much less conventional; a curried mutton pie.  The pastry on this was amazing; so flaky and crisp and buttery; so good!!  The filling was also pretty good; but for me, the pastry was definitely the star of the show.

For sides, we had truffle and parmesan fries.  They were fried nice and crisp with lashings of parmesan but I couldn’t really taste too much of the truffle.  They were still nice as fries but I was kind of hopping for something a bit more special.

This last dish was sprouting broccoli with romesco, gruyere and almonds.  I didn’t really notice the gruyere but the broccoli with the romesco was nice without being really very memorable. 

What was memorable though was the tarte tartin that we had for dessert.  It was for two to share and was sticky, caramelly and sweet.  The pastry was just right; crisp and flaky and buttery.  The apples were soft and melt in the mouth.  This was just a great tarte tartin.  Definitely recommended!

We couldn’t leave without having a peek into the pie room itself.  The room is where all the magic happens and in the evenings turns into a private dining room. 

Overall though, in my opinion, Holborn Dining Room is pretty great!  The pies are definitely worth visiting for and the rest of the food is pretty damn good too.

The other thing is that gin selection they have.  It’s a long list and will take a pretty long time to make your way through it but at least you know you’ll be well fed!

Holborn Dining Room, 252 High Holborn, London, WC1V 7EN