Glamour might be a concept very far from our minds right now, given that a lot of people can barely put food on the table or heat their homes, but it’s an important one to consider when eating out.
For me, going out to eat is never about just filling a gap in the stomach or responding to a nagging body clock that screams that it’s time for lunch. That’s why I rarely have fast food – except when derailed by the drunkenness that spins us into that irresistible world without reason or logic.
Glamour doesn’t have to be the clichéd idea that if you throw a healthy bank balance and an interior designer at a wall, they’ll automatically paint it vermilion and hang it with Swarovski crystals. In fact, unless that look is tempered by the witty design genius of a Philippe Starck or a Jacques Garcia, it can look the absolute epitome of naff – and naff is rarely glamorous.
A tiny hut serving grilled fish on a remote beach in Thailand can be the most glamorous place ever, as can a similar set-up on the East Neuk of Fife.
In fact, I’d say some of my best meals have been in places like the wonderful East Pier Smokehouse in St Monans (currently closed for winter); here you order at the counter and eat simple but exquisite fresh fish on a basic terrace with the North Sea below you.
A meal like this can cost very little but gives such a lot – not least a temporary escape from the humdrum of much of our lives. The transformative power of a good lunch can never be overstated.
The most glamorous meal I ever had was on one of my birthdays when three of us sat at the second-finest table on the sun-dappled terrace of the quintessential old school Hollywood glamour that was the Hotel Bel-Air in Los Angeles.
Morrissey, my other guest, didn’t show up but even this slight couldn’t spoil the perfect fabulousness of the day.
As we looked across to the hotel’s insanely beautiful swan lake, the sun shone, the amazing food and Napa Valley wine flowed as if by magic and I remember thinking that life would never get any finer. I was probably right.
When my friend Patricia leaned forward and said that Warren Beatty and Nancy Reagan were at the table next to us, I suddenly realised why we had been given only the second-best spot.
After all, this is a hotel where Marilyn Monroe’s old suite was now the gym, where Elizabeth Taylor’s suite overlooked the hotel’s massive herb garden and where room service arrived with tortilla soup, grilled crab cakes with sweetcorn puree and a VHS of Sunset Boulevard.
This kind of glamour is almost impossible to find now (the Hotel Bel-Air itself was subsequently razed to the ground and is now a hideous mélange of new money and mid-century modern styling) and yet, especially in the bleakness of winter, it’s something I need a hit of to keep the blues away.
A search for somewhere with a touch of glamour that didn’t involve a flight from Edinburgh Airport led us to The Adamson in St Andrews (actually, we initially planned to go to the Adamson’s sister restaurant, The Hatch, based on a good review I’d read – but they were closed that night).
The Adamson
The Hatch and The Adamson sit happily next door to each other, with a separate entrance to The Adamson’s cocktail bar in between. The building itself is wonderful and the extension of the former post office to create the cocktail bar is sympathetic and pleasing.
A blue plaque commemorates the fact Dr John Adamson lived there from 1848-1865; apart from being an eminent physician, he was also a pioneer photographer and a tireless worker for public health. That a cocktail within is named after him seems symptomatic of the age we live in and also strangely appropriate as many of us use alcohol or sedatives to self-medicate through a pandemic.
We loved The Adamson!
Firstly, entering such a handsome building inevitably gives rise to a sense of occasion, which is exactly what you want in the midst of a week-long storm in a Scottish winter.
The space is welcoming and buzzy and the young staff are brilliant.
This kind of service can’t be taken for granted right now and when you find it, it’s impossible not to think of it as being American-style, given that the service industry in the US is completely different (and largely miles better) than ours.
Here at The Adamson, you’re welcomed effusively (funnily enough, I think by an American waiter) and you have a drink in your hand within minutes. This is what you want and so often don’t get.
There’s an atmosphere here that’s at once celebratory and slickly professional.
Firstly, the lighting is perfect and the space is brilliantly planned. The art on the walls is by Calum Colvin and his mixture of tradition and modernity feels exactly right here.
This room feels good, somewhere you’d like to come back to. There’s a quiet hum of efficiency from the open kitchen, which was reassuring.
Basically, the scene is set for a great evening.
The food
The food here is also very good, with just a few caveats.
The mini baked loaf with butter, olive oil and balsamic vinegar (£3.50) was delicious – made on the premises, still warm from the oven and such a delight after the ubiquity of Wild Hearth sourdough on many restaurant menus.
My original choice of starter – duck rillettes with orange, shimigi mushroom, sorrel and leek (£8.95) – was unavailable so I ordered the calamari with lime, apple, radish, sweet chilli and coriander (also £8.95).
The starter was good but my issue with it was that the squid had either been cooked at too low a temperature or had been cooked too long. It was rubbery and difficult to chew when, really, you want grilled squid to brand your lips with that intensely searing heat of the oil when you eat it. A couple of minutes cooking is fine – here I felt that the accompanying sharp flavours were good but that the squid itself let the dish down.
David’s tempura cauliflower (£8.95) was very good, though he felt there should have been more of the barbecue sauce to loosen the dryness of the cauliflower, kale, sesame and spring onion.
Mention of this vegetarian dish inevitably raises the issues of choice (this was one of two vegetarian starters) and price.
A price of £8.95 for a starter based on an ingredient that is very cheap right now seems somewhat optimistic, but I have to say I’ve seen main courses based on cauliflower priced upwards of £20, which seems ridiculous when you see a main course centred on prime beef costing the same.
I am not vegetarian but 7.2 million of us in the UK are, and I have an increasing issue with the lack of choice and pricing of vegetarian dishes. Yes, I’m aware it’s not just the cost of the ingredients that determines the final cost of the dish — but here in Tayside not many chefs are doing interesting vegetarian food, so I just don’t see the logic in their pricing.
Were local chefs to focus on food with the complexity of Brighton’s Terre à Terre – sample dish: Korean fried cauliflower, rolled in tamari black vinegar molasses and sesame Szechuan, served with a chestnut puree ume plum sauce, kimchi soused daikon and kale crisps for £9.95 – I might understand the pricing better.
This gripe is not just aimed at The Adamson, who at least do provide reasonably interesting vegetarian options.
But David’s main course of butternut squash and sage risotto (£15.95) was a good example of a main course that was fine but in no way showed the breadth of vegetarian cuisine. The texture of the risotto was good, and it was definitely enhanced by the extra Parmesan David requested, but it just didn’t taste gutsy or punchy enough, especially when you consider the power of sage to overwhelm.
My main course of Parmesan chicken, green bean, chive skirlie, chestnut mushroom and truffle linguini (£21.95) was exactly as I imagined it – a no-brainer, big-hitting plateful of huge, rich, comforting flavours which was just wonderful.
I don’t know if an eminent physician might order it but at least the pear salad (£4.25) and the broccoli and smoked almonds (£4.25) might have ameliorated some coronary guilt. The skinny fries (£3.95) don’t count as real carbs, obviously.
Bad news for physicians is that desserts are non-negotiable. You simply have to order what we did – the dark chocolate and espresso delice, served with honeycomb, cherry and chocolate tuille (£7.25) and the chef’s physician, which is the most delightful liaison between cranberry, raspberry, white chocolate parfait, mint and elderflower (£7.25).
Don’t share a dessert. You need one each.
The verdict
The Adamson is great. Casual enough
to encourage a midweek supper but special enough to feel like a celebration, it’s just what you want from a local restaurant.
You walk out of there feeling enriched, that the world isn’t so bad after all. Service is impeccable and the food is great, minor gripes notwithstanding.
Adding a cherry to the cocktail, they serve an after-dinner drink called the Physician (Finlandia, St Germain, cranberry, raspberry, mint and lemon) that surely would be enough to send you back into the cruel world chanting ‘Physician, heal thyself’.
That, in itself, is glamorous enough for me.
Information
Address: The Adamson, 127 South Street, St Andrews, KY16 9UH
T: 01334 479191
W: www.theadamson.com
Price: Starters from £3.50 (nibbles), £4.95 (starters), mains from £12.95 and desserts from £4.25
Scores:
- Food: 4/5
- Service: 5/5
- Surroundings: 5/5
