But where have all the students gone? Photo via: The India Club Restaurant & Bar
I've been writing The Greasy Spoon since 2007, and it's to my shame that until yesterday evening, I had never eaten at The India Club. Which is strange, as the trappings and environs of The India Club are very much to the Greasy Spoon's taste. I can go further (I’m really hanging my head in shame now) and admit to you that until a few months ago, I had never even heard of The India Club, and this is coming from somebody who was actually born here in London- in the Big Smoke, and possibly even during one of the very last November pea-soupers.
According to the restaurant's website, The India League founded the club in 1951:
as a symbol of post-Independence friendship between India and the UK (founding members included Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten)...The charmingly eccentric India Club has remained much the same since its opening over 50 years ago...Today, enter a timewarp with portraits of the Independence era on the walls, bottle-green leather chairs, red lino flooring and wooden laminate tabletops
The original club was situated at 41 Craven Street and did not move to the current premises until 1964. It now occupies two floors of the Strand Continental Hotel (not to be confused with the Strand Palace); a rickety Edwardian hotel with an elusive entrance found beneath a grimy illuminated sign for Cadbury's chocolate.
Photo: Luke Honey/The Greasy Spoon
I asked one of my oldest pals to join me. We arrived at 7.30. The joint was heaving. The restaurant door opened to a layered wall of sound. A polite- if harassed- waiter in a white jacket asked us to have a drink downstairs in the bar and promised to come and find us in twenty minutes. The bar, on the first floor, is a cross between a National Service Officer's Mess, circa 1947 and the Student Union of a red brick university. It's a temple to chipped formica. A girl in skin-tight red leather trousers served us gin and tonics, with a wedge of lime. The restaurant, one floor above, is painted a pleasing saffron yellow and decorated with old black and white photographs of politicians and Indian freedom fighters. There is a whiff of the post-war canteen. The dining room was packed full of shouty old men with silver beards, scarily intellectual looking middle-aged women with cropped hairdos, and students. Lots of 'em.
Thinking about it, and if you will allow me to digress for a minute or two, what exactly is a student? The concept of 'a student' is decidedly European and suspiciously anti-English. Students have long hair, and don't wash; they lie in bed until noon, they watch cartoons on the television during the day, they tear up Parisian cobblestones and throw them at the police; they plot revolution and live in garrets. They eat Pot Noodles and read Karl Marx. When students grow up, they become accountants.
One of my favourite ghost stories is by Washington Irving. It’s called The Adventure of the German Student (1824) and it says it all:
Gottfried Wolfgang was a young man of good family. He had studied for some time at Göttingen, but being of a visionary and enthusiastic character, he had wandered into those wild and speculative doctrines which have so often bewildered German students. His secluded life, his intense application, and the singular nature of his studies, had an effect on both mind and body. His health was impaired; his imagination diseased. He had been indulging in fanciful speculations on spiritual essences, until, like Swedenborg, he had an ideal world of his own around him.
Photo: Luke Honey/The Greasy Spoon
Anyway. The food. We ordered the set menu for two for the eminently reasonable price of £16 a head. It wasn't great, and a report in the Evening Standard earlier this year suggests, perhaps, that a snap inspection of the kitchen would not be a happy experience: the coconut chutney was grim: watery and flecked with mint; a bit gritty. Packet popadums. Lime pickle, presumably from a jar. A lukewarm battered and fried green chilli. Mashed potato folded into a limp pancake. The Butter Chicken was okay- actually quite nice, in a decent, juicy tomato sauce. The Lamb Bhuna, visually, left much to be desired. The dal was thin, slightly greasy, and again, a trifle gritty, although enlivened with mustard seeds. The Basmati rice was basic and unadorned but cooked well.
The total bill came to £25 a head, including service and two pints of Cobra beer. It was if the clock had stopped in 1947; but making you appreciate the food conjured up by the terrific Vauxhall restaurant Hot Stuff even more, where for a similar price, you can enjoy Indian food of value and quality.
The India Club. Photo: Luke Honey/The Greasy Spoon
But, look, I don't want to be too hard on the India Club. You're not going there for some crooked little finger 'fane daning' experience, are you? My culinary standards are high. If you're a student plotting revolution or a grumpy old man lamenting the past, the atmosphere's terrific. It's fabulous value for money, and the service has charm. It's a buy.
I'm a great believer in the idea that atmosphere and continuity are just as important- if not more important than the food. Step forward: The Gay Hussar, Odin's, Daquise, The New Piccadilly Cafe, The Polish Club, The Vine Bar, Piccadilly; the former Joe Allen's, the original Ivy, Wilton's, and the old Annabel's. But as the majority of institutions on this august list are now kaput, you will understand that the rest of London struggles to appreciate my point of view.
Until very recently, The India Club was under threat of demolition- those pesky property developers at their diabolical work yet again, and I am thrilled to learn that the joint intervention of a 26,439 signature petition and Westminster Council has saved the restaurant for the time being, or at least until another wave of development hits London town.
The India Club Bar & Restaurant, Hotel Strand Continental, 143 Strand, London, WC2R 1JA (020 7836 4880)
Clientele: Students, Swiss Cottage Intellectuals, Out of Work Actors, Silvered Beards, Grumpy Old Men
Ambience: 1950s Officer's Mess meets Noisy Student Union Canteen
Food: Bog Standard
Service: Charming
Cost: £
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