‘Relax, I’m a trained barista’, said the text on the girl’s T-shirt. I didn’t, because she looked about twelve, and I’d just given her £2 for my morning coffee. I take my coffee seriously. A bad coffee really spoils your day. This one was not bad, but not exactly good either: an indifferent brown caffeinated sludge. Lesson of the week: never buy anything off someone who needs a T-shirt to tell you how good they are at their job.
If they wore T-shirts at Gee’s, they’d say ‘relax, we were good twenty years ago.’ I’d heard good things about Gee’s. Great things, in fact. Whenever I talked to former Oxford students they’d always reminisce about it. Roger Alton, the (possibly soon to be ex-) editor of the Independent, told me it was his favourite restaurant in Oxford. That’s quite a recommendation, because Roger has clearly had a few meals in his time. But I’d never been. One and a half years in Oxford and I’d never been to Gee’s, despite the fact that it’s barely two minutes’ drunken stumbling distance from my college. So I popped along this Sunday, because the LMH kitchens were closed and I was hungry, and there were no McCoy’s left in the vending machines.
Gee’s is housed in a lovely conservatory at the bottom of the Banbury road, between St Anne’s and St Hugh’s – undoubtedly one of the nicest rooms in Oxford. It’s owned by a chap called Jeremy Mogford, who sounds like a cartoon character but is in fact Oxford’s sole hotel and restaurant tycoon, the owner of Gee’s, Quod, the Old Bank Hotel and the Old Parsonage, as well as a natty line in tweed jackets. Jeremy’s been running restaurants for ages, and his utter dominance of Oxford’s ‘fine dining’ scene success suggests he knows what he’s doing.
What a shame, then, that the same can’t be said for his staff at Gee’s. We got to the reception desk and I introduced myself. ‘Oh, so you’re the 2:15 then?’ said the charmless maitre d’. Even in prison, they now call you by your name rather than your number. Not at Gee’s, it seems.
After sitting there for ten minutes or so, someone brought over a couple of free glasses of champagne, as part of their January promotion. It’s a nice gesture, but not so much when the glass is only half full, as was the case here. Slightly flat, too.
The maitre d’ was circling the restaurant staring suspiciously at the customers, looking for all the world like a boarding school matron patrolling the dorms after lights out, staring beadily down her nose at potential trouble-makers. The menu was dull brasserie, all pasta, burgers, coq au vin, that kind of stuff. This is fine when the prices reflect the fare on offer, but I really do object to being asked to pay £12 for a bowl of pasta.
It took ten more minutes (two circuits) for someone to come and take our order. My potted shrimps were fine, but the toast they were supposed to come on comprised just two thin strips, barely a bite each. I suppose it was supposed to be artful, but it came across as just mean.
My fish and chips were ok, apart from the brown, vaguely pea-flavoured sludge hiding under the fish, whilst Julia’s burger was awkwardly large. She pointed out that the ‘crème anglais’ listed on the menu is actually feminine, and so should of course have an ‘e’ on the end of ‘anglais.’
‘If you’re going to be posh and pretentious,’ she harrumphed, ‘you should at least get your morphology right.’ I was more concerned by the fact that crème anglaise means custard, but what actually arrived on my bakewell tart was just boring old whipped cream. The bill, with a few drinks but only one dessert, came to £100. For that, Jezza, I expect more.
Rating: 2/5
In short: Decline and Fall
