Muscle man

Just over a week ago now, to Shepherd's Market, a once dubious area between Curzon Street and Piccadilly. Known for the darkness at night of White Horse Street which led one back to Piccadilly. It must have been one of the darkest streets in the West End.

I used to know it as the home of the Grapes, a public house with an interesting clientele, next door to a very flashy wet fish shop. I shop which I don't think I ever used and which is long gone.

Much indecision in the morning, not being able to mind up whether to take in anything else on my way, but in the end settled for travelling directly to Green Park tube station. To find the area around White Horse street to be the subject of major redevelopment, with some of the parts being redeveloped having stood empty for 20 years. Including turning what used to be called Cambridge House (snapped above, named after its royal & ducal builder) back into a stately home. According to the Daily Mail back in 2012, it might make the record-breaking price, of more than £200m, for a house in the UK. Not bad for a house without a back garden and a front garden which has been paved over for cars. In all of which, the Reuben Brothers appear to be assisted by the curiously named Deconstruct UK of reference 2, which might be featuring this very same redevelopment. But read all about it at reference 1. 

The hole on the eastern side of White Horse Street. Despite which it was still quite dark.

It looks as if it is to be mostly heritage outside but the best that third millennium money can buy inside. Maybe, you will even be allowed to smoke in the very private interior.

Quick stroll around the market, to find one rather moribund dry cleaner. One large young man with five relatively small dogs; presumably a working dog walker. Two antiquarian book shops out on Curzon Street. And the Grapes back in business, looking much the same, apart from the signs and flowers which I think are new. As was the post office next door, the red sign for which is just visible top leftish. Note all the rubbish: even in Mayfair! I took a beverage for old times' sake, but it was not the place it once was, even if they had kept the layout.

Sat down outside 'L'Artiste Muscle' just as a flashy looking Bentley SUV pulled up, possibly a Bentayga, a car which was 'designed to inspire exploration in its purest form'. Impress your neighbours for a modest £200,000 or so. This one complete with personalised number plate, perhaps thrown in as an additional inducement by the dealer. I associate now to a carpet shop man in Berkeley Square telling me that a lot of his carpets were thrown into the back of fancy cars as extras. Irritating, but a sale is a sale. Various other flashy cars followed the Bentley during the course of our visit.

Bread, very daintily presented. Chewy, but not bad at all. Followed by lamb steak and chips, which was nicely presented, but with the lamb steak looking and tasting as if it had only recently emerged from a deep freeze - and chef had failed to wave a magic wand over it, as it was chewy rather than succulent, which I find to be a common failing with frozen lamb. Perhaps why the naval aunt used to sprinkle some magic white powder over hers. Something to do with tenderising it. I should have known better - and the beef stew would have been a much better bet.

But any deficiencies with the lamb were made up for by the wine which was very good. A 2017 Saint Véran Chapelle aux Loups from Louis Jadot, a brand I first came across in Lyme Regis, in the Royal Lion hotel, back in 2018. I rather liked it then.

This may be the Chapelle aux Loups in question, in a place called Chasselas in Saône-et-Loire. For which we have: 'Selon la légende, les têtes de loups, qui ornent les quatre angles, rappellent l’époque où les gens de Cenves et de Tramayes, en chemin pour Mâcon, y faisaient halte à la tombée du jour pour échapper à inhospitalité des forêts. On avait alors baptisé l’endroit « La chapelle aux loups » et le village pris le surnom de Chasseloups, resté jusqu’à ce jour avec le nom des habitants : les Chasseloutis'.

Notwithstanding, I might say that Bing was better at turning up stuff about hunting permits for wolves than wolfy chapels in Saône-et-Loire. Or even Romanesque chapels.

While Louis Jadot appears to be a big operator in the wine world - at the very least a big brand - and is to be found at reference 5.

Rather good Tarte Tatin for dessert, even if the tart bit seemed to have dissolved. Served with a spot of cream and a spot of rather good Calvados to follow - which last was very reasonably priced: bar prices rather than restaurant prices - which can sometimes irritate.

This crane provided some entertainment, with a chap in the sort of cradle an office block window cleaner might use, swinging around on the end of the hook for a while. No idea what he could of been doing. But whatever it was, you would not catch me doing it. Maybe fifty years ago, but not thirty, by which time the vertigo was well established.

Rounded off the proceedings with a couple of fags, the first time I have smoked anything for more than a decade. Made cigarettes, which I never did smoke much and which I did not much like on this occasion. But I was surprised at the speed with which my fingers started to tingle, that is to say less than a minute or so. There must have been plenty of active ingredients.

From which I associate to a different sort of addition, that is to say the peanuts from Sainsbury's noticed, for example, at reference 7. They are not addictive in the way of cigarettes, where if you have a few today, you are apt to want a few tomorrow. But they are in that if you have a pile of them in front of, in their shells, and you have already eaten a few, it is quite hard to stop munching away at them. The good news is that if you put some distance between you and the pile, one usually forgets about them.

The view in the other direction, with the Hilton tower in the background. A place where I have taken the odd beverage in the distant past. But I don't recall using the pub on the left, the one above the second car from the left, white on top.  Furthermore, in might be called the Market Tavern, but it doesn't look much like a regular boozer on Street View.

All in all a good find. I will be back.

Eventually made it back to Epsom, where I availed myself of a waiting taxi.

References

Reference 1: https://www.reubenbrothers.com/mayfair/.

Reference 2: https://www.deconstructuk.com/. 

Reference 3: https://www.lartistemuscle.co.uk/.

Reference 4: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2009/09/culinary-faith-restored.html. There is a snap of the shut-up Grapes somewhere, but can't find it just presently. But I did turn up this reminder that there was once a May fair in what is now Mayfair.

Reference 5: http://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/01/royal-lion.html.

Reference 6: http://www.louisjadot.com/.

Reference 7: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/11/wine-buffs.html.