Restaurant Review: Cinnamon Club, Westminster, London

Cinnamon Club, Westminster: Restaurant Review:

Cuisine: Indian Fine-Dining
Style Points: 5/5
Price: ££
Overall: 5/5

Cinnamon Club has a reputation for being the best Indian Restaurant in London and it certainly lived up to this on my long awaited visit. Regarded as the pinnacle of Indian cuisine in London, I have been craving to go to Cinnamon Club for years and was beyond excited when the perfect opportunity came up.

It cost £2.6 million to set this restaurant up, by converting the Grade II listed building which was the Old Westminster Library. The actual dining space is a calming and spacious large high ceiling room with rows of books lining the upper mezzanine. This is a beautiful space with a sense of grandeur and authenticity to it, helped by the leather panelling and classic wooden tables and chairs. This is also reinforced by the waiters who dress in smart and crisp black suits.

The restaurant also houses two very different bars, one within a library which exudes a calming atmosphere, and a slightly more quirky and modern bar downstairs. As always with Michelin Starred restaurants, the bathroom is luxurious to the extent that it stocks L’Occitane products. In fact, this is the first restaurant I have been to where there is a doorman to open the door for you as well as call you a cab should you require it when you leave, throwing the swank levels well off the scale!

Would I Want Seconds?

My Starter - Amazing chutneys!

Without a doubt. Executive Chef, and celebrity in his own right, Vivek Singh, is amazing, as is his menu. The dishes on his menu all have traditional Indian origins but are also given slight European touches to deem them worthy of a Michelin starred kitchen. Cinnamon Club’s aim is to combine traditional Indian cooking techniques with modern European design templates to create dishes that are very distinctive to this restaurant.

Cinnamon Club has a variety of menus to choose from including a highly acclaimed breakfast menu, an eight-course Feast Menu and special festival showcases. Alongside this array of food, the extensive wine and cocktail menu also reflects the diversity and quality on offer, which is to be expected from a restaurant which has two bars.

One fear with top quality restaurants like this is that the portions will be tiny, but this is not the case with Cinnamon Club. From the three courses that I ordered all were a decent size. More importantly of course, the flavours are beautiful and well thought out. The spicing in my curried char-grilled chicken breast were warming and soft on the taste buds. My dessert, a white chocolate parfait, was stunning, and a perfect way to end an exquisite meal.

Could I Afford Seconds?

The reason why it has taken me years to step into Cinnamon Club is purely because of the price. Politicians frequent this place for lunch regularly but when you’re not getting your meal expensed Cinnamon Club can mean it is out of bounds for a lot of people. However, I was beyond thrilled when I discovered the restaurant had launched a ridiculously low priced set menu which allows humble beings like myself to dine at such an exclusive restaurant.

The menu consists of two courses for £22 or three courses for £24, which would usually be the price of one main course if dining from the a la carte menu. What’s more, if you choose to dine from this menu in the month of May they will throw in a free Strawberry Burst Cocktail, which I must say is quite heavy on the alcohol! This menu is available Monday to Saturday: 12:00pm–2:45pm, 6:00pm-6:30pm and from 9:30pm onwards, and it is definitely worth a try. In fact, I plan on making the most of this offer and dining at Cinnamon Club as many times as I can this month!

Overall 5/5

I’ve tried a few high-end Indian restaurants in London now and Cinnamon Club is one of my favourites.

Although this is one of the best and most exclusive restaurants in London, diners eating from the cheaper set menu are not hurried along or brushed aside. Instead, the service delivered by the doorman to that by staff in the two bars and in the main dining room is attentive and well-informed; it’s obvious that the staff here are trained to make everyone feel like a VIP and it’s a feeling I’d happily get used to!

I would highly recommend Cinnamon Club to all and am yet to think of anything negative about my experience.