This article is taken from the March 2025 issue of The Critic. To get the full magazine why not subscribe? Right now we’re offering five issues for just £10.
Something calling itself the Gentleman’s Journal recently explained to readers that Wiltons restaurant on Jermyn Street offers a bar option where customers can pop in for champagne and oysters rather than commit to “a full sit-down meal”.
Wiltons has long been the Establishment’s establishment, where Nannies in wildly unflattering uniforms served comfortable club food to power with arch side-orders of nursery scolding. Founded as an oyster stall on Haymarket by William Wilton in 1742, it tootled to its present location in 1984 and has remained aloof to fads and fashions ever since. The velvet curtain at the door coddled an opulent, timeless space which benevolently insulated the haves from the world’s alarms.
The Nannies were introduced by Jimmy Marks, who managed the restaurant for many years, famously refusing to get to his feet for any but the most august of customers, royalty included. They are still there, in their pinnies, as are the rather wonderful paintings, and the plushy carpet with its jaunty pattern of molluscs.
Both the cooking and the eavesdropping remain top-notch. The high-sided green booths which flank the left side of the restaurant are notoriously the site of many a state secret which might have remained secret if the acoustics weren’t so cosy. One wonders why Murdoch’s rabble went in for all that phone hacking; all they needed to do was make themselves inconspicuous at Wiltons with a novel and a lovely glass of Chablis.
Adulteries are a popular topic, as are numbers, big ones, but aside from the lady in Wallis Simpson’s jewellery who was patiently explaining to her husband why they needed a Falcon because the Gulfstream couldn’t take off from the paddock, my favourite non-actionable nugget was the chap who leaned forward to his companion to confess that he’d seen a fella in the House wearing brown shoes on a Thursday.
And the food? Aside from a concession to the ladies of a tuna tartare with hamachi, the menu is Edwardiana all the way: Stilton soufflé, sole meunière, fish pie, trifle. Lobster cocktail wallowed in a peachy bath of proper Marie Rose sauce; grilled halibut came upright and glistening with a thoughtful side of pickled cucumber. Gratin dauphinois has just the right balance of creaminess and bite; baked wild mushrooms, their frills delicately crisped, delivered an arboreal punch to contrast with the soothing elegance of the fish. Wiltons still offers real savouries along with cheese: Welsh rarebit was four neat pennants of joy, simultaneously crunchy and unctuous.
Wiltons is justly proud of the perfection of its seasonal game and oysters, the latter rotated with arcane expertise, but puddings are perhaps the pinnacle. What the Gentleman’s Journal might refer to as “afters” are often an afterthought; here they take the cake. Wiltons bread and butter pudding is the ur version, a gloriously unselfconscious golden brick encased in a friable caramel crust, airy and almost mousse-y inside, with lingering notes of cinnamon and vanilla. It will never be surpassed, and it comes with extra custard.
Pedants who drivel that Britain has never had a real cuisine are ignorant of the fact that unlike France, British food did not ascend to the restaurant table from the fields, or descend from a désuet court. Wilton’s cooking epitomises its true origin, the country house. British food derives from hothouses and dairies, walled orchards and still-rooms, grand and simple as a Queen Anne façade. But the National Trust sign has gone up on the ha-ha and the coaches are queueing in the avenue; the idyll has become a parody. If the essence of kitsch is imitation, Wiltons is impersonating itself.
Once upon a time, a man who turned up in shirtsleeves would have been (ceremoniously) stuffed into a pongy jacket and an inferior tie, but the place has broken faith with its own authority. Wilton’s website meekly suggests ties are “welcome”, but the rule has not been enforced for years. The only neckwear available at the reception desk is for sale. A Wilton’s tie costs £95, or perhaps sir might enjoy a Silver Tankard at £180 or fatuous Caviar Cufflinks at £180. Now, even here, the exit is through the gift shop.
The private dining room is named for the masterful Mr Marks, but his ghost has grown timid. Doleful were the faces of the waiters and vast were the trainers of the athleisured party they were serving. Brown in town is as naught to cashmere polo shirts.
Restaurants are seldom entirely compelling because of their food, but often because they act as a marker of where we are, how we think, what we believe to be good. The food at Wiltons is about as good as food can be, but it no longer believes what it pretends to. Money has lost its deference to tradition, and tradition can’t afford to fight back. Well, good riddance and death to the patriarchy, except the patriarchy is still very much enjoying the full sit-down, chucking back Loch Ryans and Montrachet in its smug fleeces and terrible shoes, and Nanny is no longer in charge.
Wiltons, 55 Jermyn Street, London SW1Y 6LX
