Ambassadors Clubhouse wants you to party. Never mind that, as per the adenoidal pronouncements of our new prime minister, we are collectively bound for an autumn of unrelenting fiscal gloom. Never mind the palpable, cuffing season vibe-shift towards boxsets, radiator-warmed pyjamas and cloistered frugality. Almost everything about restaurant group JKS’s much-anticipated return to the big ticket hospitality fray – the chilli-spiked Punjabi margaritas, the regally rich, £45 lobster korma, the basement club that stays open until 2am – is like the decadent equivalent of a brimming shot glass devilishly pressed into your palm.
So, I suppose, there is a sort of irony to the fact that, during my time there, one of the constants was the toil of a pair of neighbouring diners who had brought their very young children along. A recalcitrant toddler was coaxed into his chair with the dangled promise of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on an iPhone; his four-week-old brother was fed beneath a draped muslin; a spread of ornately presented chutneys, breads and tandoor-blistered meats was momentarily accessorised by a massive toy dinosaur. “Sorry about all this,” said the dad, late on, having recognised me. “I think the team here were a bit worried that us sitting next to you might affect your review.”
They needn’t have been concerned. Not just because you’d have to be quite the arsehole to be annoyed by the mostly benign presence of some kids and their sleep-deprived adults getting lunch. But, also, because the combination of light familial chaos and South Asian luxuriousness seemed, somehow, to perfectly encapsulate the skill and approachable charm of this place. Ambassadors Clubhouse is a typically fine-drawn love letter to the princely flavours and riotous drinking traditions of the undivided Punjab; it is a recognisable follow-up to ritzy, two Michelin-starred celebrity fleshpot Gymkhana. Nonetheless, it deals in the sort of unbuttoned, democratically indulgent good time that works whether you are wearing Hermes or Huggies.
As a project, it is the opposite of a rush-job. JKS (aka sibling founders Jyotin, Karam and Sunaina Sethi) first acquired the vacated site of what was once Momo late last year, and appear to have spent the intervening period grooving a typically meticulous backstory and fit-out. Inspired by the Dalhousie holiday home of the titular, party-loving dignitary who was their maternal grandfather, its a maximalist sanctuary – all filigreed jewel box interior, riveted vault doors and bustling patterns – amid the antic scrum of Heddon Street’s animatronic ramen bowls and overbearing Bowie-theming.
Papads and chutneys were up first: a silver skiff piled high with bubbled crackers and abetted by an uncommonly memorable dip tricolour of BBQ imli, mooli raita and rambunctious, vivid green mango and chilli. From there, you’d do well to send for Nargisi chicken koftas, essentially poultry Scotch eggs, and the fryer-bronzed pakode balls that are chilli cheese on toast distilled to a pleasure-bomb of two life-affirming bites.
Squint and you could be in Gymkhana, Brigadiers or other non-JKS businesses like Gunpowder, Jamavar and Dishoom. This familiarity, the world-beating contemporary Indian landscape the Sethis helped to establish, works both ways. Yes, there is a kind of deja vu to the eye-widening tenderness of mutton seekh kebab, the creamy, ghee-puddled intensity of an outrageous Ma Ki (as in ‘mother’s’) dal, or the beetroot Raj kachori chaat that maybe nudged the cymbal-crashing collisions of salty and sweet a little too high.
You get the sense of deep emotional investment and restaurateurs that are enjoying themselves
But the flip side of playing to a savvy crowd is a certain boldness and confidence; a swagger that engenders dishes like Hariyali (meaning ‘green’) keema, rigged with the ferocious snap of abundant chillies and made with chopped rabbit rather than mutton or chicken mince, or a transcendent Ajwaini warqi naan that combines smoky char, fragrant carom seeds and the buttery flakiness of roti canai. JKS businesses can occasionally exhibit a slick bloodlessness. Here, despite the gloss, you get the constant sense of deep emotional investment, light experimentation and restaurateurs that are enjoying themselves.
We were too stuffed for pudding so finished with complimentary speckled, passion fruit and white chocolate truffles, and the heady lusciousness of Alphonso mango jellies. By then, the two children at the next table had fallen into the contented post-prandial snooze I was suddenly craving. This irresistible new blockbuster’s raving days will come. For now, it strikes me as the sort of clubhouse that everyone will want to be a member of.
