Hawksmoor St Pancras

Eight weeks is not long to get a new restaurant off the ground but this was the timeline for Hawksmoor founders Will Beckett and Huw Gott to make the former Midland Grand dining room their own and throw open the doors for soft launch on Monday 17th November. The room, in the west wing of Sir George Gilbert Scott's Grade I-listed St Pancras London hotel, didn't need much of a facelift but a deep green paint job, smart leather banquettes and parquet flooring have added the Hawksmoor 'look' to the marbled columns, enormous window and soaring ceiling. The menu will be familiar to fans of the steakhouse group: bone marrow oysters, plump crevettes with an addictively delicious cocktail sauce, quality chargrilled steaks and a panoply of sides (including the wonderfully nutmeg-laden creamed spinach). This is not an opening to reinvent the wheel but a reliable place for rail passengers to meet and eat. If time is tight, stop in at the adjacent neo-Gothic Martini Bar for a Pink Gibson and beef dripping hash browns.