Vivre is the restaurant at the Sofitel hotel at Heathrow Terminal 5, where we were staying overnight. We ate here a few years back on a previous trip. It’s a large room and was pretty much full – one of those places that will be pretty much full most nights, with something of a captive audience. We went with low expectations and they were met. The problem was that it was all desperately slow- two courses taking nearly two hours . Of course, they’ve no incentive to do any better. As for the food, it was OK but no better than OK.
Cauliflower soup had little flavour and could have been anything beige. Mushrooms on toast were OK – needed seasoning and the toast needed to be actually toast, rather than warm bread. There was a handful of rocket and scattering of Parmesan which perked things up a bit.
After quite a delay, we had to chase the main courses., which then came quickly. Pork belly was nicely roasted. There was decent mash, griddled Hispi cabbage, a dab or two of apple puree and a cider sauce. Pizza margherita was akin to a decent quality supermarket pizza. Nuff said.
By this time, we’d lost the will to live so decided to pass on dessert and just ordred coffee. It came eventually. Which is more than can be said for the bill that we’d asked for at the same time as the coffee. We had to ask a second time. Chasing things up seems to be the way to go with Vivre. Maybe next time, we’ll just go to Marks & Spencer and buy the makings for a “picnic” in the room.
