Nellie's at Simpsons-in-the-Strand: Raise a toast to this boozy opera

Going Out | Pubs, Bars and Nightlife
Honestly, imagine having a type of toast named after you.

Not just any toast, but a toast used around the world, adored and inherent; one that pairs so elegantly with potted shrimp and various pâtés.

The great chef Auguste Escoffier boasted a catalogue of culinary triumphs.

His 1897 conjuring of melba toast out of yesterday’s bread — sustainability and all that, nothing new — is one of the more famous.

In one kitchen years ago I was required to construct little toast bowls, each one a patchwork of triangle-cut sliced white, to be filled with crab mayonnaise.

Tedious work, but good work.

Nellie’s is the only room in which designer Shayne Brady was given carte blanche by King.

And so comes a brooding world of deep reds, ornate drapery, safari patternage and rich textures of velvet.

If it sounds like I’m describing a yoghurt from Marks & Spencer, I can only apologise.

It suits the short drinks and cocktails.

Most are £16.

The signature peach melba sling blends Peruvian pisco with peach schnaps, raspberry and lime juice, and is topped with cream soda.

It’s a devotional nod to Escoffier’s vintage dessert, built of Nellie’s toast.

Otherwise, the classics, from vesper martinis to Manhattan, are expert.

More impressive than anything is the service, smooth and operatic as it is: bartenders somehow know who you’re meeting even if they haven’t been told; waiters remember your order from weeks before; drinks are efficient and paced well.

It’s a theatrical place, drama without narcissism; somewhere the lighting was nailed long before any ice was shaken and where the music filters through the room like bergamot and thyme.

Nobody who visits here will have had a toast named after them, but they’ll be made to feel like it.

100 Strand, WC2R 0EZ, simpsonsinthestrand.co.uk
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107 Muswell Hill Road, N10, @eatrossella
Thai chain Giggling Squid reported a record turnover of £77m in the last financial year.

Family-run Italian Rossella has taken over one of its sites all the same, just off Broadway in Muswell Hill.

The original Rosella has been going since the 1970s, serving wine from their vineyard in Campania alongside traditional pastas and pizza.

The new location is bigger and will operate as a restaurant , deli and bar.

There’ll also be a tiramisu trolley.

Opens in May.

73 Prince’s Square, W2, @juliesw11