We almost walked out of Forty Dean Street after ordering, which would have been a first, but in the end we decided to persevere and pray that we would not regret it. With the weather being remarkably hot and sunny currently, Forty Dean Street has both full frontage windows that open the restaurant up to the fresh air and three tables outside where you can really enjoy the blue skies and sunshine. It's a reasonable venue choice then when you want to enjoy the best weather day of the year, and it's open all day which is still not as common in Soho as you might expect.
With one of the outside end tables already occupied, we chose the other end table, and while the table itself was, lets be generous here and call it raggedy, it had also not been wiped down from the previous customers and the sticky surface, visibly soiled, was in desperate need of a clean. Staff acknowledged that we had sat down and brought us menus; they didn't however wipe the table down and in the end we had to ask them to do so.
When they did wipe it down, it was just with a cloth, no sanitising spray or the like, so ensuring whatever was on the table was further dragged across the entire surface. After that, they placed our cutlery straight onto the table surface itself. Finally, one of the forks they set down for us had been through the dishwasher cycle but had not come out clean but that too had clearly escaped them. At this point we had a serious discussion about leaving.
We knew already the food would have to be pretty spectacular to really recover from this and of course, it wasn't. To be fair, the Antipasto with Italian Cured Meats, Pickles, Pecorino Cheese and Bruschetta was actually pretty good and had the hygiene issues not arisen, we could imagine ourselves advocating stopping by here on a nice day for a sharing plate and a glass of wine as a decent enough Soho hangout. The main courses (spaghetti vongole, seafood risotto) we considered average. Not terrible, nothing to rant about, but nothing to shout about either. We both reached for the salt to add a bit of seasoning, but this was basic food with limited possibility to lift it at the table with a pinch of anything.
With the pasta priced around £14, it represented poor value versus local competition. Combine that with the other issues and we were happy to make a speedy get away without even a thought of dessert.
With one of the outside end tables already occupied, we chose the other end table, and while the table itself was, lets be generous here and call it raggedy, it had also not been wiped down from the previous customers and the sticky surface, visibly soiled, was in desperate need of a clean. Staff acknowledged that we had sat down and brought us menus; they didn't however wipe the table down and in the end we had to ask them to do so.
When they did wipe it down, it was just with a cloth, no sanitising spray or the like, so ensuring whatever was on the table was further dragged across the entire surface. After that, they placed our cutlery straight onto the table surface itself. Finally, one of the forks they set down for us had been through the dishwasher cycle but had not come out clean but that too had clearly escaped them. At this point we had a serious discussion about leaving.
We knew already the food would have to be pretty spectacular to really recover from this and of course, it wasn't. To be fair, the Antipasto with Italian Cured Meats, Pickles, Pecorino Cheese and Bruschetta was actually pretty good and had the hygiene issues not arisen, we could imagine ourselves advocating stopping by here on a nice day for a sharing plate and a glass of wine as a decent enough Soho hangout. The main courses (spaghetti vongole, seafood risotto) we considered average. Not terrible, nothing to rant about, but nothing to shout about either. We both reached for the salt to add a bit of seasoning, but this was basic food with limited possibility to lift it at the table with a pinch of anything.
With the pasta priced around £14, it represented poor value versus local competition. Combine that with the other issues and we were happy to make a speedy get away without even a thought of dessert.