[Manchester, city centre] Adam Reid at the French

It’s a rare occurrence that we both eat a faultless meal. Not even all of our previous five visits to Adam Reid have ticked that box. But this one did. A skilfully conceived menu which flowed seamlessly from one course to the next, with staff both in the kitchen and front of house at the top of their game. All the more remarkable when you think that they’ve only been open for a couple of weeks after being closed for pretty much all of the “Covid time”. Some things are unchanged – chefs bring their food to you and explain the dish (including Adam on several occasions), front of house remove the finished plates, reset your table and keep your water topped up, a knowledgeable sommelier explains his wine choices, if you’ve taken the matching package, and how they work with the food.

We are no longer fans of the very long tasting menu concept. At nine courses, Adam stays within the bounds of a meal to enjoy, rather than one to endure. But no surprises there – this is all about hospitality.

There’s some snacks to start. A slice each of smoked cod and another of roast ham, with some finely grated Doddington cheese. There’s crackers to load it on to. And pickled and fresh vegetables for flavour and texture. That’s followed by more single bite items – “fish pie” (a tiny pastry case filled with pickled red onion, potato mousse and topped with trout roe). Barley and raw beef wrapped in a sliver of smoked celeriac. And an outstanding cracker cheese sandwich – using Kirkhams Lancashire, it’s characteristic sharpness softened with hazelnuts.

Bread comes next. It’s soft, it’s dark, it’s rich. And there’s beef butter to slather over it. Then the first “proper” course. A single BBQ’d asparagus spear, drizzled with a smoked egg yolk sauce and a grating of summer truffle. This is lovely and bang-on for seasonality.

Mussels were fat and juicy. Adam brought this explaining that they had some debate about using mussels or lobster but felt that, on taste grounds, this was the right decision. There’s a cream sauce, very lightly flavoured with curry spices and a scattering of tiny cubes of pork back fat. Sweetbreads may be the best version that we’ve ever tasted. They are first poached, then quickly fried so they go a little crisp and firm with none of the mushy texture you can come across. It’s dressed with what the menu describes as “dirty mint gravy”. Can’t recall why “dirty” but it’s deffo a well flavoured gravy with a spike from mint. Very clever dish. And what a success

John Dory was the “catch of the day”. Perfectly cooked with a crisp skin. That’s dressed with a pickled elderflower hollandaise. I particularly liked the tang of this – I’m a fan of elderflower cordial and the same flavour is there in the background.

The final savoury course was Rhug Estate organic chicken breast. The skin was topped with herbs and garlic before it was all roasted to the “just cooked through” point. A few new seasons peas were just right as an accompaniment.

The first dessert was a baked custard flavoured with chamomile, topped with still crunchy rhubarb and an apple sorbet. There’s a place for fully cooked rhubarb but crunchy also works, albeit differently – you wouldn’t want it in a crumble but here, it works. The second dessert is “tipsy cake” with whipped cream. It’s a light flavoursome sponge but a bit of faff to eat as they only give you a toothpick. Break a bit off, spear it with the toothpick, dunk it in the whipped cream and scoff. It’s served with a small glass of a very flavoursome cold tea. I’m not a tea drinker but thought this was really rather nice – not at all sweet, so balancing the cake.

And, finally, espresso and petit fours are included in the price. Good coffee. Good petit fours.

We’d had a lovely evening and the fact that the place was pretty much full on a midweek evening bodes well for the future.

8 Likes

Fabulous - love your description of the meal.

Was it called “dirty” because brown sugar was used, per Martha Stewart?

I’m afraid neither of us can remember the “dirty” bit, Peter. There may have been a bit of sugar in there but it wasnt sweet. Adam described his intent was to get the flavours that you have with a traditional gravy made for your roast lamb Sunday lunch. It worked.

1 Like

Sounds like a really lovely meal!

1 Like

We’ve been back!

It’s always a special occasion to eat at the French, even if it’s not an actual special occasion. Everything comes together to make it a lovely evening – the room itself and its place in the city’s history, the relaxed but on the ball service, chefs serving you the food they’ve cooked and, of course, the food itself. In its last edition in 2020, the Good Food Guide rated the restaurant as the eleventh best in the country. On the strength of the two meals we’ve eaten there this year, I reckon it’s got even better.

The origins of Adam’s dishes are rooted here in our region. You see that as soon as you look at the tasting menu headed by a dish called “A warm Northern welcome”. It’s thick slices of a wonderful sourdough from the Pollen Bakery just the other side of the city centre in Ancoats. There’s butter of course and a little cup of the most intense onion broth. Game on!

That’s followed by a series of snacks. These have evolved from those we ate earlier in the year but there is a similarity. A single bite fish pie, topped with fish roe. A mousse of Kirkham’s Lancashire cheese smeared on a cracker and topped with chives and a crisp hazelnut praline. And a crisp pastry cylinder filled with braised oxtail and topped with their take on taramasalata. There’s a dish of horseradish cream to dunk it in.

The final snack is a take on leftovers – “Yesterday’s dinner”. There’s a chunk of hot smoked salmon, a slice of ham and a slice of Doddington cheese. There’s oat crackers to load it onto, grain mustard and a dish of lightly pickled vegetables. It’s a serving that makes you smile.

Then it’s on to “Tonight’s tea” – Adam using the word that many of us round here still call our evening meal. There’s raw scallops to kick off this section. Delivered daily from Scotland, served with thinly sliced local turnips. Then what the chef who brought it described as “a salad but not a salad”. There’s celeriac puree and chunks of the vegetable, a powerful mushroom gravy and a drizzle of a melted British Camembert style cheese (Tunworth?). A fish course of perfectly cooked monkfish comes with a strand of wilted greens, a fried mussel and a most fantastic sauce made from roasted squash and a very light touch with curry spices. Serve me that sauce and the Pollen Bakery sourdough bread for dunking as my last meal and I’ll die a happy man.

The final savoury course features North Wales venison. Fallow deer loin and fillet, both perfectly cooked to rare, come with the earthy sweetness of beetroot and a slight bitterness from crispy cavolo nero. It really is autumn on a plate.

Then it’s dessert time or, as the menu has it “And for afters”. The first one is as light as a feather – baked custard and a little poached pear. The second is a much more butch affair – and an improvement on the version served earlier in the year. Then it was served almost as a petit four. Now, it’s a proper helping. The chef cuts the cake in half for us, plates it, adds whipped cream and a drizzle of rum, to enhance the not insignificant quantity that’s been baked into the cake.

And, to finish, there’s real petit fours to go with the espresso that’s included in the menu price.

As mentioned earlier, front of house service was spot on. And I must mention the sommelier – always a key feature for us with tasting menus. I don’t drink alcohol and my life companion does. That makes the easiest thing to do is for her to take the wine flight, rather than ordering a bottle. The guy here is at the top of his game – selecting an interesting range of glasses to go with each course. All delicious and none of them wines she would have ordered in the ordinary course of things.

Great evening.

5 Likes

Nice!!

That’s exactly what we used in Australia, too, where I grew up. Sometimes, it can be awkward - I still remembered one incident, way back in the mid-1980s, when my mum invited a couple of Fijian friends over for tea, and they turned up at 3.30pm. :joy:

Sounded like you had a wonderful evening. Wished I could be there!

1 Like

In which case, did you also call your midday meal lunch or dinner? Here, “dinner” would have been traditional, in the sense of it being the main meal of the day. It’s usage lingers on in general culture. The “feast” on Christmas Day is always called “Christmas dinner”, even though it’s tradiitonally eaten at lunchtime. And the catering staff in school canteens were always “dinner ladies”.

1 Like

We always use lunch for the mid-day meal in Australia (and New Zealand, too). Dinner was used only to refer to a formal meal.

Maybe a regional thing? When I grew up in NSW it was always called dinner, not tea.

Possible, because when I was in the country towns in Western Australia - Manjimup, Pemberton & Esperance, they seemed to use dinner there on more occasions than tea. But tea would be the common term in Perth itself.

I remembered how “different” people from the Eastern States could be when, back in 1987 when Perth was hosting the America’s Cup, the first time it was held outside the US, there was an influx of American visitors/tourists to Australia for the first time.

There was a current affairs programme from one of the Sydney-based stations where the two presenters were at pains to play down stereotypes of Aussies which Americans may have. One of them said, “For example, we Aussies don’t say G’day all the time when we met each other.”
I was absolutely flummoxed, because we do say G’day to everyone we meet - all the time - where I was. I was wondering then if people in Sydney (or other Eastern States folks) do behave like West Australians!

I don’t know what they are talking about, in the 1980s plenty of people in Sydney said g’day to everyone!

But we NEVER talked about putting shrimps on the barbie!

1 Like

But then “don’t come the raw prawn with me” is perhaps my favourite Aussie expression.

Now you have to explain what that means. It sounds useful!

An explanation for you here:

I think I first heard the phrase said by Aussie comedian/actor Paul Hogan. Apparently, in one of his films, it had to be changed to “shrimp” for better understanding by Americans. Yanks have shrimp (not shrimps). Aussies have prawns. Brits have shrimps (not shrimp) and prawns - shrimps are very tiny things - the sort that the colour blind French call crevette grise but Britons call brown shrimps.

2 Likes

Thanks. I’ll try to work that into my vocabulary.

Not as easy as working ABBA song titles into the discussion at a business meeting as a colleague of mine once did.

2 Likes

They must have been emulating Colin Powell, who was a well-known ABBA fan.

1 Like

So. Ate here last night for the first time.
It was part of a present for my other half.
It came highly recommended by the esteemed Mr H.
I wanted to love it.
But.
Well.
I didn’t, to be honest.

I wonder whether part of this is the venue.

It’s an impressive space in an impressive hotel but since I was last in the hotel the ‘vibe’ has changed. Where once there was an opulent ‘ meet me for a quiet drink’ atmosphere in the lobby they have now moved the bar and plonked a circular affair right in the middle.
Maybe it’s because it’s a bank holiday Saturday night but that bar is ‘lively’. And whoever is in charge of the bar has stacked the dirty glasses - a lot of them - right next to the reception desk for The French so that is your view when you arrive for your posh night out.
It doesn’t feel special. It feels like the arse end of an All Bar One.

And so, suitably unnerved, in we go to dinner.

The dining room itself is plush, thick carpet, soft chairs, nicely lit. Makes you think it will be good despite the storm in the lobby.

But the longer I sit there, the more I wonder about it all. Is it all it first appears or ( as my mother would say ) all fur coat and no knickers ?
Are those tea lights in a little pot on our table ? Are there in fact a load of tea lights in bigger pots here and there? Why does the loo seem like it hasn’t been checked for a while ( lots of hand towels in a pile spilling out of the ‘used’ basket).

Why is that being missed in a place with Michelin aspirations ( and prices )?

And as we begin our experience and I wonder, as there isn’t a restaurant bar ( they make this very clear in their email confirmation- no doubt sensibly wishing to disassociate from the mess outside) might they offer us a pre dinner drink ? Nope - it’s straight in with - do we want the wine pairing ? No thanks as neither of us drink much - at which point the sommelier seems to think that means we have no interest in wine and visibly stops bothering to engage.

And, isn’t it warm in here ? Like, noticeably warm at the start and then it goes much cooler later on - like when you are on a plane and they whack the air con on to wake you up ? It feels a bit ‘ Right, it’s 11pm get the cold air on and let’s clear the place !’. It’s all just a bit odd.
As is the 89s and 90’s indie soundtrack. I mean I love The Cure and The Stone Roses but I’m not sure those tunes fit this space. Unless they are using the Roses for a demonstrably Manc vibe ? Hopefully not because that would seem dreadfully touristy - and another point knocked off the Michelin score card no doubt.

What about the food, though ? - I hear you ask.
Well it was okay but paled in comparison to the Black Swan at Oldstead where we ate at a few weeks ago (and which has, lest we forget, just the one star ).

It started with the malt bread and the beef butter John referred to. This comes with a little onion and beef broth - which is quite salty but fine. The bread is large, which again feels odd when you’ve not even had a snack yet.
It’s not often I feel overfaced by the arrival of bread, but it felt a bit hefty to start with.
Do we eat all of this now before we eat anything else ? Or is it here for the night ?
Ease use in with some snacks first so we can get the measure of the place, please !

When the snacks arrive they are a mixed bag. The fish pie topped with roe is bang on -,a tasty single mouthful. The cheese sandwich John described still featured and was also good.
Sadly so was the ‘ last nights leftovers’ affair . I really struggled with this. We had some ham, some smoked salmon some pickled veg, a little mustard and a cracker. What, nowt moist ?! Or nowt that brings it all together ? ( as they say on the telly). It felt to me like some nice stuff that didn’t really go together at all. Smoked salmon and ham on the same plate ? Eh ? A bit like a posh wedding buffet platter. With a very salty cracker and quite a sharp mustard. And some pickled veg. I say again - Eh ? To be fair my other half really enjoyed this, as did Mr H. So, let’s put that down to it being just me.

My biggest disappointment of the night was the advertised ‘ eel and tongue sausage roll with horseradish’. It wasn’t a sausage roll it was a cylinder. That was a letdown I should have seen coming but it might still have been amazing, given the ingredients It wasn’t. My cylinder wasn’t even full. Surely if you are dishing up cylinders you fill them right up ? You don’t want people to be sat there wondering why it isn’t filled do you? I know this is only a detail but that’s surely what it’s all about at this level?

Of the two fish courses we had opposing views. The raw scallop with a scallop sauce my other half loved ( she was glad of the bread for sauce mopping) - it was a bit heavy on the fennel for me, especially with something raw.
Catch oi the day ( which AR himself brought out ) was turbot. It’s not my favourite fish but was lovely here- lightly grilled and with a herby foam/ sauce that lifted it up rather than clonking it over the head.

Meat main was sirloin with some squash purée, a mushroom sauce and a beef fat dumpling to mop up with. It was good, but not great. A nice tea but nothing special and weirdly lacking in anything even pretending to be green veg or to cut through the richness.

First pud was the custard with rhubarb combo John mentioned. We had no rhubarb pieces but a sorbet. I think pieces would have worked better. It was nice but a bit sweet for me.
And so to the tea and cake. They explained in painstaking detail how they make the cake dense so it opens up and absorbs the syrup ( to be fair the front of house staff were all very enthusiastic ) and how the crème fraiche is to offset that. Then they pour rum on top. I’m not sure whose idea that is but they want raffling. The cake was lovely, the CF was indeed a great counterpoint but the rum just roared across the top of everything and spoilt it.

The petit four encapsulated the difference between the food here and the Black Swan for me. At the Black Swan they gave us an artichoke caramel and a little sweet artichoke tart to finish. Here we got a single chocolate and rum truffle. It was fine. It was quite big. But it was nothing special or memorable. It was our evening in microcosm, the overall food experience as one mouthful.

And then, to finish your evening off, you pay back outside at the reception desk. Only now it’s 11pm and someone has kicked the party on to the next level. More Revolution than All Bar One and here I am forking out circa £400 and the card machine doesn’t work and has to be waved in the air and then replaced.

We wondered as we headed back to our hotel, if this was too soon after going to the Black Swan. for us to go for another ‘posh’ experience. I don’t think my disappointment is due to that at all. It’s more I dont think this wasemphasized text a special experience. Sorry to say John, but they are never getting a star at this rate.

4 Likes

Awww. Sorry to hear you didn’t love it as much as we do.

1 Like

Excellent description of a disappointing experience. Best part for me was your mother’s “all fur coat and no knickers”. Sort of like our Texas saying “all hat and no cattle”.
Better luck next time.

2 Likes