A world view while you eat

Restaurants with views have become somewhat passé.  To eat at a great height with the world at your feet is a splendid feeling; and certainly was so in the 1970s when such restaurants were in vogue.  I remember as a child going to the Post Office Tower in London, an iconic 60s landmark, which boasted a revolving restaurant on the top.  There was excitement at the constant changing views of the city the restaurant afforded, from the verdant Regents Park to the white Fitzrovia.  

There was the Chinese restaurant atop the Searock in Bandra, the food was terrible Indo-Chinese, but that is not why people went.  It was the fact that it revolved.  The revolution took us from the jaded magnificence of Bandra Fort, the decaying sanatoriums of Bandra Bandstand to the shimmering blue waters of the Arabian Sea.

For a more urban view, there is the Pearl of the Orient restaurant atop the Ambassador Hotel at Churchgate which still revolves.  This restaurant, like the hotel, exists in a kind of 70s time warp.
However, recently I was privileged to dine at a restaurant which boasted the most magnificent view, and was also an exceptional restaurant.  The restaurant was Galvin at the Windows, at the London Hilton, sitting atop 28 floors, the panoramic view erupted from the very heart of London (technically Hyde Park corner) and was awe-inspiring and intoxicating. It is a serious French restaurant run by two brothers, Chris and Jeff Galvin who also run the marvelous Bistro at Baker Street.  The food here is much grander than the Bistro cooking: it is the Michelin style of grand cooking.  It is also substantially more expensive, but not outrageously so.  With the recession on, you have several fixed price options, the two menus were 4 courses at £45 or 7 courses at £65, which given the quality of the cooking ingredients is not unreasonable.  For this you get an exquisite mackerel tartar with avruga caviar as a first course, a beautifully prepared turbot, followed by Welsh spring roasted lamb of great delicacy and  excellent puddings.  I had the house favourite which was the combination of a milky pannacotta set off by the intensity of poached cherries.

If the Galvin at the Windows scores as the restaurant with the grandest view of London, Asiatec sitting atop the 30th floor of the Mandarin Oriental in New York, must rank at its equivalent in Manhattan, taking in a splendid sweep of the Central Park.  It also provides a brilliant and sophisticated European Asian fusion cuisine which really works.  In Mumbai if one forgets the Pearl of the Orient revolving restaurant, the restaurant which has the most stunning of views, is Souk at the Taj at Apollo Bunder.  It is great for lunch when you can see across the harbour, the dockyards and the bustle of the city and the mezze is the best in Mumbai.