You’ve got the cheesy card, made the breakfast in bed and come Saturday night you’ll place the cherry on the cake (two spoons, obviously) with the table at that cosy little spot around the corner. Sounds like the recipe for romance, doesn’t it? Not necessarily, say Britain’s best chefs.
While you might view Valentine’s night as a chance to turn up the heat and have a little fun, restaurateurs and chefs see you as something else: potential trouble. From drunk diners to heavy petting over the hors d’oeuvres, they have seen it all.
“We once had a couple who snuck off to the loo mid-meal, only to return looking rosy-cheeked and hair a little skewwhiff,” the chef and Great British Menu winner Kate Austen admits. She has worked in some of the world’s best restaurants, from the three-Michelin-star Restaurant Franzten in Sweden to Marcus Wareing’s multistar Marcus in London and AOC in Copenhagen, where she became the youngest head chef of a two-star restaurant in the world.
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But that doesn’t stop badly behaving customers. “I’m sure they thought we were none the wiser. The problem was that we were a three-Michelin-star restaurant. Whilst we may look like we aren’t watching, each guest’s every move is being observed to ensure not a beat is missed. It’s hard not to notice absent seats when we only have 23 in the dining room.”
Kate Austen: “We once had a couple who snuck off to the loo mid-meal, only to return looking rosy-cheeked and hair a little skewwhiff”
Austen also recalls Valentine’s couples with very specific instructions about what time the meal needed to be wrapped up at — “The money on the meter was running out, if you know what I mean” — and, on one occasion, a guest getting so drunk on wine pairings she fell asleep on the loo — “Her husband saw the funny side and we helped her out.”
The Irish chef Richard Corrigan, who owns Corrigan’s and Bentley’s Oyster Bar in Mayfair, is used to customers getting carried away. In the Nineties he opened his first restaurant in a Soho townhouse, Lindsay House. As at all of his restaurants, Valentine’s was one of the biggest nights of the year. “There is always a bit of sneaking off, not just on Valentine’s Day. Famously a couple would come in around once a month and disappear to the toilet in between starters and main course. We had to pretend we had no idea what was going on.”
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With three decades in the business Corrigan knows what spells romance, and what ends up with an early cab and the bill paid before dessert. Out: three-hour tasting menus, intimate dining rooms — “There is no general atmosphere in a restaurant with just ten tables, it’s really, really awkward” — and restaurants with no bar. “If you arrive and have to go straight to your table, there’s no place for ice-breaking,” he says. In: champagne and oysters at the bar before going to your table, plenty of martinis and a busy restaurant with energy.
One such dining room is Dorian, the Michelin-star bistro in Notting Hill that counts the Beckhams, Gary Lineker and Lily Allen among its regulars. Tables here are so coveted that an invite-only WhatsApp group was set up for VIPs who want a fast-track table or the golden 7.30pm booking.
Come Valentine’s Day, though, the special treatment for favourites vanishes: no priority bookings for friends, no big groups. February 14 is the one night in the calendar when the whole restaurant is arranged into tables of two and the reservation book is open to everyone. Admittedly, the owner Chris D’Sylva tells me, most of their regulars are away anyway. “Valentine’s always falls in half-term so they’re skiing.”
The restaurant has been fully booked for Valentine’s Day since the beginning of November, with a waiting list of “up to 20 couples, and a few tables held back in case our bachelors want to do something last-minute”.
Which means that first-time diners and new couples might need a little extra help creating that romantic atmosphere. “Maybe that night I will say to our guys: do your best to massage the situation and break the ice. But in our own style. Our team all have great chat.”
There will be no gimmicky Valentine’s Day cocktails or special heart-shaped puddings on the menu. “They’ve come for the Dorian experience, so we don’t change anything,” D’Sylva continues. One thing he is certain of is that they will sell a lot of caviar: “I’d bet the house on that.” Dorian has become famous for its caviar rostis: mouthful-sized fried rosti wedges topped with caviar that cost £35 a pop. “We had a table of two mums come in who had their kids at ballet class at the Tabernacle. They had 12 caviar rostis between the two of them and left.”
For other customers, Saturday night will just be an excuse to skip the washing-up and indulge. But for chefs and restaurateurs like D’Sylva? “It’s just one of the 330 days we’re trading a year and one of the 660 services we were doing.” Just please don’t try and sneak off to the bathroom between courses.
It’s tragic when they say the proposal has failed
By the restaurateur Jeremy King
Valentine’s night is the worst night of the year to be in a restaurant, and I feel that quite unequivocally.
There are a number of reasons for this. There is immense demand, of course, but it tends to be almost entirely tables of two. To accommodate that, restaurants put in extra tables, which diminishes any sense of romance. There is nothing more uncomfortable than sitting in a line of tables of two opposite each other, where you are often closer to the people on the next table than to the person you are actually dining with.
Jeremy King at Arlington, his restaurant in London
JACK TAYLOR FOR THE TIMES
That sort of arrangement might work in Paris but here in London people are very uncomfortable with it. I find tables of two opposite each other uncomfortable anyway — if you sit opposite someone, it’s a confrontation. If you sit side-by-side or on a corner, it’s more intimate and relaxed. Restaurateurs worry about the lack of covers, but I think it works the other way, because those corner tables could be tables of three.
As Valentine’s Day comes around, I’m looking to give people a good evening, but the atmosphere on the night is often bad, and it’s frequently an unhappy evening. The reason it’s unhappy is because it’s full of pressure. When any human emotion or activity is formalised through a financially motivated device, it’s bound to be a problem. Some people are happy and involved with each other. Others are there out of a sense of obligation. That’s where the trouble begins.
Many couples, particularly those with young children, don’t often go out as just the two of them. If they do it’s usually with friends. On Valentine’s night they’re forced into this face-to-face situation. One of the couple — traditionally the wife in a heterosexual relationship — is often sitting there thinking, “Come on, tell me you love me.” The normal refuges — talking about the children, talking about work, talking about the restaurant — are unavailable. You have to talk about each other.
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They may not have had dinner together since the previous Valentine’s Day. There’s a fair chance they may not have had sex, and sex seems to become obligatory on Valentine’s night. That’s another pressure. People drink more to alleviate it, and men are prone to picking a fight. At some point someone may say, “I sometimes wonder why we’re even together,” and that gets seized upon.
You have more arguments in restaurants on Valentine’s night than on any other night of the year. I’ve seen people storm out many times. People also choose Valentine’s night for proposals. I’ve had people come in with a ring and say, “When the dessert arrives…” and then come back and say, “Don’t bring the ring — the proposal has failed.” It’s a tragic atmosphere.
At heart, Valentine’s Day is an opportunity for people to get together. It’s harder to meet people now. The Valentine card can be a catalyst, because it allows a degree of subtlety. Being invited to a restaurant on Valentine’s Day has no subtlety at all.
I always encourage people to go out the day before or two or three days later. The moment we are told to celebrate something it ruins it. Restaurants should be catalysts for whatever people want to make of them. If you must go out on Valentine’s night, sitting at the bar is best. It’s more relaxed, more intimate and you’re not under pressure. Sitting side by side changes everything.
As told to Alfred Tong