the rib room

Chapter eIGht
the rIb room
When the Rib Room opened in 1961, it served roast beef in handsomely
thick slices. After 50 years, it still does. Very few other British
restaurants, except Simpsons on the Strand, have thrived by offering
their diners what is fundamentally the same menu over such a time
period. The Rib Room had, from the beginning, a winning formula,
whose beauty was its simplicity: why change it?
‘the concept is unique,’ observed the Catering Times in 1977: ‘seven-bone ribs of beef, butchered american-style.
and the object is to serve the best beef in London.’ the tatler could testify to that object having been met. ‘It is
certainly some of the best meat in London, and about the most expensive,’ it glowed on February 15, 1961; ‘for this is
essentially a rich man’s restaurant, organised to satisfy the highest standard of 1960 anglo-american sophistication.’
readers who aspired to eating beneath the rib room’s crystal chandelier would have to ‘allow £2 a head, without
a drink.’ a sumptuous price, but a sumptuous experience: the hallowed beef was served on hand-wrought silver
plates, set on red Irish linen table cloths.
the team had spent months searching for a butcher who could supply grass-fed aberdeen angus sirloins of the
quality required. the almost irresistible appeal of the result became apparent when nine Italian waiters were
sacked shortly after the opening. one of them had been discovered in the pantry, overindulging in the restaurant’s
speciality. he had to go; when the others protested, they followed him. ‘all the fellows who work in the rib room
eat beef,’ the Food and beverage manager told an american publication. ‘but this guy was found eating enough
for six normal people.’
the times, writing in the blasé 1970s, had fun at the expense of the english inn style of the rib room, as it was
then decorated, which was at odds with a sophisticated hotel operation:
A waiter put a slab of Aberdeen Angus, described in the menu as ‘a veritable beefeater’s bonanza’,
before a young couple obviously were not used to this sort of thing at lunchtime. ‘Not much of the
steer left after that was cut,’ said an American who was sitting at the next table and obviously
lapping up the old world atmosphere of The Carlton Tower’s Rib Room.
After all, was not this the roast beef of old England? And did not the menu urge on the hungry
wayfarer with much talk about ye innkeeper’s desire to please and ye host bidding ye eat?
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Later, as ye innkeeper shot some of his guests to the summit of London’s
newest hotel at 500 feet a minute, he explained that it would be wrong
to describe The Carlton Tower as an American hotel. In London today
your hotel had to be an international one if it was to survive. But, he
added, the Carlton was traditional as well as international.
Trying hard to find some tradition, we went behind the scenes where a
dishwasher was slowly ploughing its way through the dishes of 3,000
meals. A buzzer sounded in ye innkeeper’s breast pocket. He pulled out
a miniature radio transmitted and explained that every executive was
centrally connected in this way.
but the proof of the Yorkshire pudding was in the eating. During the galloping
inflation of the 1970s, the hotel put up its prices rather than compromise on quality
or portion size. Diners recognised that they had to pay for the best. as the Catering
Times reported in 1977, ‘the policy has meant a 45 per cent increase in prices over
the past two years but so far there has been little customer resistance.’
Right: In 2006, four men who had been enjoying the hospitality of the hotel bars were seen
manhandling the Rib Room’s beloved bull statue into the back of a white Phantom Rolls-
Royce. The police traced the number plate to Yorkshire, but became reluctant to enter the
owner’s house when a woman appeared at the door with a Bengal tiger on a lead. However,
the sculpture soon found made its return to the hotel – having been mysteriously left outside
the back entrance.
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Kings of the Kitchen
For twenty-seven years, Donato russo
has devoted most of his waking hours to
perfecting the art of cooking roast beef,
while Simon Young (above), the Carlton
tower’s executive chef, is the pillar on
whose shoulders the hotel’s whole food and
beverage operation rests. altogether, the
hotel’s banqueting, pastry, room service,
rib room and the Chinoiserie kitchens
employ a total of forty-five chefs.
‘twenty five years ago, when I started as a
commis chef at a hotel around the corner,
I used to walk past the Carlton tower
and dreamt of working there,’ remembers
Simon. ‘Now I write every menu in the
hotel.’ his day starts at 6.30am, when
he walks through every kitchen opening
fridges and checking ingredients. at 9am
comes ‘morning prayers’, when he delivers
his report on the findings and discusses the
day’s business. From the comfort food of
room service to dazzling canapés in the ball
room or asian-style tapas in the Gilt bar,
he will provide whatever guests want, in an
operation that continues around the clock.
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the rib room,
temple of beef
Do you want to know how to cook the
best roast beef in the world? First, find
a seven kilo aberdeen angus rib joint –
five ribs for preference – that has been
hung for twenty-eight days. the Duke
of buccleuch will be able to supply
you…although not, perhaps, with meat
butchered exactly as the rib room has
it, for that is a unique preparation. on
the top of a rib room joint is a thick
layer of fat; cover this generously with
salt, making sure that none touches the
sides of the ribs. Cook for two hours at
a hundred and eight degrees. When the
beef comes out of the oven, the salt will
have formed a crust, to be thrown away
before serving, with the fat. Its purpose
is to provide a layer of protection,
making the interior of the joint cook
more slowly. trim. Do nothing more.
and then wait for at least an hour, while
the beef rests at a warm temperature.
You’ve waited? Good. the meat is now
ready to serve. Carve one extravagantly
thick slice – an american cut. Voila!
Donato shares some of the mystery:
‘Cooked this way, a single joint will be
well done on the outside, rare within.
Look at this meat – tender, moist and a
beautiful ruby red. We add nothing to
the beef, not even seasoning. With this
is served gravy, made from the left over
bones and meat discarded in cooking;
we simmer it with beef and vegetables
– nothing else. It is absolutely natural.’
Fillets and sirloins are apt to be drier;
in Donato’s opinion, the rib is the best
of cuts, being the most succulent and
flavoursome. ‘there are three or four
different flavours in a single slice.’
as it was in the beginning, so it is now:
roast beef comes with Yorkshire pudding.
potatoes, these days, come when asked
for: a concession to more healthy
eating. Different types of mustard and
horseradish are offered as a matter of
course. Guests are free to sprinkle rock
salt and grind the pepper mill if they wish.
but in this temple of beef, some meat
worshippers partake of this wonderfully
natural product just as it came onto their
plate – with nothing on it at all.
Right: Abdel ?, Rib Room waiter
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Left: Sundamoorthy Veerappan enjoys
preparing the baked potatoes that have
been served in the Rib Room ever since it
opened – although in these more weightconscious
times, they are only added to a
guest’s plate on request
Right: Dinesh Mehta puts the finishing
touches to a dessert
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Left: Children are shown the arts of
the kitchen during a masterclass with the
pastry chef.
Right: Country comes to Hans Town when
the Rib Room is given a rustic make-over
as part of the Sloane Street celebrations for
Chelsea Flower Show. Each May, the most
prestigious of all British flower show opens in
the paradoxically urban surroundings of the
Royal Hospital; all Chelsea comes to a halt
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the art of conviviality
the rib room has always been hung
with original paintings and prints by the
artist Feliks topolski. appropriately,
it was here that a dinner was held for
topolski’s seventieth birthday in 1977 –
‘an enormous table for twenty-four and
authentically celebratory waiters,’ as the
artist described it. Sitting among various
diary writers were arabella Churchill
(invited ‘because she personifies my hippy
period’), prince George Galitzine, who
had taught topolski english, the architect
Cedric price and topolski’s family: wife
Caryl, son Daniel and daughter teresa.
topolski described himself as ‘an old frog,
phonily brooding,’ but concludes:
‘however, the baked alaska with seventy
candles arrives and Caryl is at ease.’
Left: Above the bar is Feliks Topolski’s study
for the Coronation frieze that HRH the Duke
of Edinburgh commissioned for Buckingham
Palace in 1960
Right: A painting by Feliks Topolski,
commemorating his seventieth birthday dinner
at The Rib Room
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Chef bernard Gaume
James Walsh, who worked in the Carlton
tower kitchen in the 1970s, remembers
‘the culinary brigades’ in the Carlton
tower London under Chef bernard
Gaume. ‘this was one of the most
pleasant work experiences I have ever
had. mr. Gaume was a very progressive
thinker and the start of a new wave of
chef at the time. he was very quiet and
well mannered, no tantrums, although
there was no mistaking his displeasure
when he chose to show it. he was a
very young man at a time when most of
the chefs in the major hotels in London
were of a certain age. he brought a new
approach and tolerance that I had not
seen in hotel brigades until then.’
one of mr. Gaume’s regular guests
remembers how his cooking transformed
London’s bleak culinary landscape:
‘he was the first to introduce pan-fried
foie gras.’
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