Gimlet is a place to indulge like everyone’s looking. The tiered room is an amphitheatre of performative consumption, where heroic presentations of beluga caviar, grilled lobster, wagyu sirloin and flambéed crêpes add their own sly wink to the fin de siècle scenes. And yet, Andrew McConnell’s flagship remains a democratic beast at heart. Its permanent buzz owes thanks to a bar menu rocking premium oysters and fries (chase them with the limey kick of the namesake cocktail) and a dining room that makes an occasion of everything, from baked scallops and hollandaise sauce to charry Lyonnaise sausage skewers punched up with guindilla pepper and fried garlic or a precision-cooked strip steak. Even the cheeseburger gets in on the act. Oozing with American cheese and a dill-forward sauce in a fluffy potato bun, it’s exclusive to the post-10pm supper menu on Friday and Saturday – and if it doesn’t make people jealous, nothing will.
Sharyn Cairns
