Josephine Bouchon, London: ‘Beautifully executed’ – restaurant review

‘This is restaurant as stage set, with enough wood panelling to make buying shares in Pledge seem a smart proposition’: the dining room at Josephine Bouchon. Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer

Josephine Bouchon, 315 Fulham Road, London SW10 9QH. Starters £8.50-£19, mains £21-£44, desserts £8-£12, three-course menu £29.50, wines from £27

It starts with a terracotta bowl filled with salty nuggets of deep-fried pork fat. We are in a French bistro, so naturally they have a mellifluous name. They’re called grattons Lyonnais, which sounds like a grade three piano piece, but in truth describes scratchings without the tooth-threatening crunch. Regard them as a culinary declaration of intent. As their name suggests, we are in a restaurant celebrating the cheek-smearing, cellulite-encouraging, winter-challenging dishes of Lyon, where even the local salad comes with a poached egg and thick pieces of fried bacon. Perhaps none of this sounds like your thing. What a shame. I thought we were friends.