What can I say that hasn't been said before about Heston
Blumenthal’s Fat Duck restaurant? That
my bucket list only had one item and it was crossed off today? That I’m such a big fan of Heston I've got
his number on the back of my duffle coat?
That it was even better than all three of his books led me to dare
imagine?
First, the back story.
Like 90,000 other people I entered my name in the ballot last
October. And, like so many of those that
weren't computer generated by some total arseholes in the finance industry with
no respect for the rules that enable civilisation, my entry was not
successful. Nobody we knew got offered a
place.
Fast forward to Easter Sunday 2015, where I was rostered for
dessert at my family’s lunch. We had not
long finished eating the brûléed lemon tart I’d made out of Heston At Home, which everyone loved,
when my phone rang. It was The Fat Duck
restaurant, advising that they’d had a cancellation for Wednesday’s lunch
sitting and was I interested. Hmmm, let
me think about that it’s a Mastercard and the number is…
68 hours turned out to be the perfect notice period; enough
time to recover from the shock and get excited, without having to wait too long
for it to all happen. Our dining companions,
Anne and Paul, had been part of our syndicate from the outset. We each entered the ballot, with the promise
that anyone whose golden ticket came up would take the other three. Fortunately all of us had very understanding employers
and we found a babysitter willing to listen to Eleanor complaining all day that
we didn't take her with us.
Following the obligatory photos out the front, we walked
into the start of a mesmerising sensory experience. A long dark hallway led up to a dead end,
until a door magically opened and we were welcomed into a dark wood paneled
room that was flooded with natural light and simultaneously larger and smaller
than my previous nights’ dreams.
The staff were all, without a single exception,
wonderful. Friendly but not intrusive,
knowledgeable about all of the dishes, excited to watch our reactions to the
magic as though it wasn't something they’d been doing six days a week for the
last two months. We were never once
asked if everything was OK, because they knew it was all perfect. At least twice, someone picked up an empty
plate from our table, and while politely listening to our babbling fandom handed
it silently - and without even making eye contact - to a random passing colleague
who took it without question as though it's something they practise. Maybe it is.
And the food. Oh the
food. All seventeen courses of it. As mentioned, I've got all the Heston books
and have studied in detail many of the recipes we were served. I was expecting amazing textures that can’t
be recreated without whipping siphons, sous vide techniques and nitro. Everyone knows about the conch shells hiding iPods
that play sounds of the beach to evoke memories and intensify the emotional
experience. I've made Heston’s bacon ice
cream and suffered the brain-twisting incomprehension of something that looks
like ice cream on the plate, and feels like ice cream on the tongue, but is savoury
and therefore just wrong. It’s all about
science and psychology in the pursuit of excellence. On paper it sounds almost cold and
soulless.
What I hadn't expected was the flavours; the way a single
mouthful could contain so many different things that each stood out individually. The Waldorf salad lollipop where the apple,
walnut and celery elements were each completely distinct, the way they would be
with a real salad. In what universe
could a tiny grilled onion-half be my favourite element on a plate that
included pork belly? Snail
porridge? Please sir, I want some
more. We all ate our lamb jelly with
spoons, then later went back to drain the glass it was served in and found the
mint aspect was more pronounced once the jelly was room temperature and liquid:
two for one in the same meal! The bread
was, quite simply, the best bread any of us had ever eaten (or tried not to
fill up on). And yes, a Toast Sandwich
is two pieces of bread with a slice of toast in the middle. What else could it possibly be?
I simply can’t pick a favourite dish: I can, however, pick a
least favourite. “Sound of the sea”
achieved its mission admirably, because it completely evoked the sounds, smells
and tastes of the ocean. Trouble is, I
hate the beach. At least that course
gave my face a break from smiling like an idiot.
We chose one of the matched wine packages for the relatively
bargain price of $200 per person. Money.
Well. Spent. All of the wines we had
were Australian (except the sake, of course) and they were amazing. I just can’t image what the $450 per person
wines must be like, let alone the $1,150 per person package. Yes, you read that correctly. Bevan was delighted by a tea menu that was
notably longer than the coffee options, and I was delighted to hear our waiter
admit that they knew they’d have to improve their coffee game when they moved
to Melbourne.
With a 1:30pm allocated reservation time, we were the last
table to arrive and the last to leave.
We watched the sun set over the Yarra and had the Crown Casino fireballs outside
our windows at 6pm with a few dishes yet to go. Each of the courses was small enough that, despite their quantity, the total volume of food wasn't stomach-bursting. I probably could have gone a kebab on
the way home actually, except that now I can never eat again because I have
tasted perfection.
