
Indeed, the reason that 21212 is so called is because there's a five course menu with 2 choices on the first course, 1 soup, 2 choices on the main course, 1 cheese course and 2 desserts. But the menu itself reads more like a shopping list of ingredients and you're left wondering how it can come together as a coherent plate. Consider the following:
Slow baked fillet of young 'chicken' halibut, smoked salmon, red and yellow pimento squares, cherry tiger tomatoes, Thai sweetcorn, saffron egg pancakes, pink breakfast radish, yellow courgettes, piccalilli mayonnaise, apricot puree, capsicum, yeast sauce.
That's not the choice of starters, that's a single starter! Again, even with the same food on the plates, they could simplify the menu descriptions but they've chosen not to, the menu is supposed to take your breath away, it does. We also think that these must be huge plates of food to accommodate the sheer quantity of stuff listed, we've never seen a menu like it before.
We're also wrong footed by the premeal offered munchies, a bag of crisp brought to the table and emptied into a bowl at the table. We kept thinking 'what's the twist' here was but we didn't get it; most things here have something of a shock value. Bread too was different, pink in fact and amongst the many flavours that go into it are curry and cumin though for us, we didn't think the bread actually worked, too doughy and therefore too chewy and too heavy. But it confirms our suspicions, nothing tonight is going to be 'normal'.
Our choice of starters then is shown below.
The mains had similarly unusual titles, Seabass 3x3x3x3x3 and 'All Things White', it's constantly intriguing. The menu descriptions are again shown below.
Service was wonderfully friendly, indeed the Scots have been very friendly to us throughout our time here, though they were perhaps a little short staffed with, at the end, a lengthy waiting to have plates cleared from the table. This is though small fry as drinks flowed well from the equally friendly and engaging sommelier.
And then there's the room. 21212 is located in a refurbished Georgian townhouse and when we say that no expense has been spared in turning this into a chic modern restaurant, it's like saying that Kitching's food is interesting. The quality (and cost) of the interior seems close to an unprecedented scale. It is though something to be enjoyed .
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