Coming from a culinary family, Michel Roux Jr. is a well-known chef on British television. He has been regular guest and even host on Saturday Morning Kitchen as well as MasterChef UK on the BBC . He is an established chef that operates multiple restaurants, including Roux At Parliament Square (which we visited for this review), Roux At The Landau and the Michelin star awarded Le Gavroche.
The restaurant may not be in the most obvious place, but the name already gives a hint as to where it can be found. It is located between government offices, a large museum and Westminster Cathedral. Even though all these buildings may be closed in the evening, don’t expect it to be nice and quiet outside. The proximity to the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben on one side and St. James’s Park on the other side, means many people pass through the street on foot or by car. Don’t worry, inside you will not notice.
The entrance of the restaurant looks really nice; A beautiful old and stately building. It did surprise me that there wasn’t anyone at he reception area, but as soon as we entered a lady came to the front. Interior looks nice and matches the stately building. Compared to other restaurants, you will immediately sense it is a more formal atmosphere. The feeling really comes from the somewhat classic features like marble fireplace, wooden panelling on the walls and the wallpaper. In a way it reminds me of a French castle where aristocracy held state dinners. Difference with how I imagine these state dinners would be the smaller tables and somewhat dated-looking plates on the tables. The feeling really came from the decoration and interior design, it does not mean that the staff is distant, arrogant or anything. The staff are all but these things, although some are a little difficult to understand because of their accent.
As we do more often, we opted for the set menu. Here we had 7 courses plus amuses and coffee & petit fours. Spoiler alert: Forget about Michelin stars and ratings on internet, when looking at the food it is very difficult for me to chose which was best, Petrus or Roux at Parliament Square. Let me take you through the menu….
After two small bites, we had some gazpacho. It had a somewhat fruity flavour, which was the strawberry that was in it. It was a nice unexpected surprise that added another dimension to a dish that I find normally not that exciting. It was soon followed by our fist dish of the seven: Beetroot with cheese and seeds. It was presented like you see in books and pictures. The goats cheese has been replaces with a regular cow cheese at my 
request. At first glance it might look like just a bit of beetroot jelly, but hiding under some leaves there is some actual beetroot. The beetroot easily can (and will) overpower the cheese I had. Here I can only blame myself, as I asked for the cheese to be replaced. I can only imagine that the stronger flavours and slight sharpness of the goats cheese goes well with the mild sweetness and strong flavours of beetroot.
Where the beetroot dish had some bold and strong flavours, this wasn’t so for the dish that followed: Langoustine with a consommé and some nice herbs. When the plate is brought to the table, the consommé isn’t yet on it, but the waiter will poor this on when the entire table has a plate. The consommé is nice and clear, but has a bit of fat floating on top. The ravioli was excellent and so was the amount of herbs. With the delicate flavours of the shellfish it is so easy to ruin with a forest of herbs. Overall it was a very good dish, as you would expect in a restaurant of this caliber.
The next two dishes had, like the langoustine, real delicate flavours. Up next was an asparagus dish. Quite simple, but really well executed: asparagus with a confit egg yolk. Nothing really to say about this one, because that really was the dish. The asparagus were cooked well, but at first glance the egg yolk looked dried-out. The waiter does explain the dish and mentions how the yolk is prepared, so we knew it wasn’t really dry at all. The only thing I was missing a little on this dish was some crunch, but other than that I couldn’t fault it. Asparagus were followed by some trout. Nicely presented on a plate in a similar colour. Perfectly flaky with a crispy skin and nicely pink in the middle, what more can you ask for. This was probably one of my favourite dishes of the evening. It came with some broccoli and a sauce with lemon. Sprinkeled over the sauce were some bits of almond for a nice bite. Absolutely delicious!
The only real meat course was a pork presa. This is a piece of pork shoulder, marbled with fat and therefore juicy and tender when cooked. Because of its marbling it earned its nickname “Wagyu of pork”. The nice thing with this dish, apart from the absolutely perfect piece of pork, was the fact that they didn’t go for the usual potato mash or baked. Instead it was some wheat which had some nice earthy flavours. On top of the dish was something that looked like a prawn cracker from a Chinese restaurant, but was really pork skin crackled to the extreme. Normally I do not eat skin because, well…. I don’t like the thought of it. However, this one made me curious and it really was nice. Perfectly light and crispy. This dish really was delicious for a humble pork shoulder.
By now we are getting to the end of the evening and the end starts with ice cream/sorbet. One is gin & tonic and the other apple. Where the apple was delicious, the gin & tonic just isn’t my thing. The bitter combines well with the fresh and slightly sweet apple, however it was simply a little too bitter to my liking.
Dessert was beautifully presented and consisted of a white chocolate parfait, strawberry and pistachio. It was a perfectly balanced dish. The strawberry was nice and fresh and combines well with the rich and sweet white chocolate parfait. Personally, I think the combination of basil leaves and strawberry is great and I would have liked a leaf or two more. The cake was simply good, little sticky and covered in crunchy bits of nut, just how I like it. All and all a great ending of a fantastic meal.
This restaurant may not have a Michelin star but this is one of those places that proves that you don’t need a star to serve great food with good service. The atmosphere may feel a bit too formal or stiff for some, but please don’t let that stop you from going here. For what you get the amount of GBP 80 (EUR 100/USD 125) excluding drinks and service charge (but including coffee and petit fours) is very reasonable and less than Michelin star restaurants of comparable quality. Whether it is on business or a special (personal) occasion, I would highly recommend this restaurant.
Restaurant location: View on Google Maps
Restaurant website: http://www.rouxatparliamentsquare.co.uk