Grace Dent reviews Lurra: elegant, pristine and serving the best olives in London

Grace Dent tucks into a Basque banquet at Lurra
A little more romantic if someone turned the dimmer switch down a touch: Lurra
Grace Dent4 December 2017

The first question people usually ask me at parties is: ‘How do I choose which restaurants to review?’ To which there is no neat answer that leaves the inquisitor satisfied. It’s a bit of all kinds of things: who the chef is; who the chef isn’t; its spanking newness; its revered oldness; its bewildering concept; its irresistible menu; or, in Lurra’s case, its name.

It sounds a lot like Cilla Black — God rest her soul —in full Saturday night 1980s TV Scouse drawl promising us ‘A Lurra Lurra laughs’. Yes, this may sound flippant, but restaurant names are important and Lurra’s was sealed in my mind before the fitters had even carried in the stoves.

Also interesting to me was that this Basque restaurant has popped up on Seymour Place, W1, adding to that marvellous foodie cluster of The Lockhart, Vinoteca Marylebone and its own sister restaurant Donostia. This is an incredibly fortuitous backstreet to find oneself lost along. Just don’t — please — ask me to explain where Seymour Place is when you’re in any sort of hurry.

It’s sort of round the back of Marble Arch, down Edgware Road, but veering right a few blocks, then heading for the bottom portion of Seymour Place itself. Not the top half. See? I told you it wasn’t simple. Imagine me shouting this at you at 8pm while standing outside The Lockhart’s Showdown cocktail bar after three Smoking Banditos with Patrón Silver. Let’s face it, there’s a chance you’ll end up at Madame Tussauds paying £33 to stare at a trumped-up shop mannequin that partially resembles Lady Gaga.

I visited Lurra in perfect Seymour Place conditions: the final burst of summer; diners and drinkers milling about the various bistros after dusk. Smokers, flirters, al fresco diners — Richard Curtis could have written the scenario. He’d probably like Lurra a great deal, too. Here is an elegant, pristine room in pale wood, marble and stone, with a private courtyard that seats 20, plus a planned chef’s garden to grow the restaurant’s herbs. It’s all damn civilised.

It would be a little more romantic if someone turned the dimmer switch down a touch. Right now, it feels more like a place to schmooze clients, but there’s no harm in that. Lurra — which I’ve now learned means ‘land’ in Basque — promises to deliver the very best authentic, beautifully sourced produce, cooked in the traditional ‘Erretegia’ manner using charcoal and wood grills.

Delights include whole grilled turbot, Galician Rubia Gallega steak, kokotxas (cod tongues) and ceps with egg yolk and grilled red peppers. It’s peculiar, with all this going on, that one of the things I recall strongly from my night at Lurra was the bowl of excellent crisp paprika-titivated almonds and another full of the plumpest, sweetest green olives I’ve ever seen in London.

That’s a big statement, but true. I demolished these with a glass of dark, cherry-red Trinch, while trying to stop stealing my companion’s sourdough and bubbling hunk of grilled bone marrow.

Lurra’s delicate courgette flower stuffed with cod brandade is the stuff of dreams. A monkfish tail appeared deftly cooked in a slick of butter festooned with slivers of fried garlic. Being gluttonous pigs, we ordered the £55 Galician steak for two.

I could tell you the story of the 14-year-old cow the steak comes from, and how its lifestyle leads to a specific level of marbling, but perhaps hearing the cow’s likes, dislikes and hobbies takes something away from eating it. I will tell you instead that the chips here, with a snifter of vibrant yellow aïoli, are outstanding.

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By this point, I must admit, we had consumed a gargantuan amount of garlic. People in Chigwell could possibly smell me. A cleansing bowl of fresh blackberry sorbet did its best to dissipate it, but it’s fair to say my Uber rating has taken a battering. I’d do it again in an instant.

Lurra

1 bottle Trinch £33

1 olives £3

1 almonds £2

1 courgette flower £7

1 bread & bone marrow £4

1 monkfish £9

1 txuleta £55.25

1 grilled red pepper £5

1 fries £5

2 scoops sorbet £4

TOTAL £127.25

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