Week in Reviews

Here's Matthew Norman's review over at the Telegraph of Ametsa with Arzak Instruction in London, the new Basque-inspired restaurant at the Halkin Hotel from Juan Mari Arzak and Elena Arzak. He gives it 2 1/2 stars (out of five): He calls the space "dismal": "the ceiling of this clinical and charmless space dangle scores of curious objects resembling either robotic phalluses or cigar tubes..." The food was "technically flawless, exquisitely presented but bewilderingly dull." And finally: "We had long since become reverse Basque separatists, eager to secede from this joyless experience." [Telegraph]