Downtown Mayfair, London, restaurant review Finally, after squinting at the list in a room underlit even before someone dimmed the lights, I simply chose the second cheapest available (an inoffensive Italian Sauvignon at - Oof - £46). By then, it had already become clear that we had descended into a circle of hell beyond Dante's imagination, although, with hindsight, an initial hint came when I rang to book, and the chap warmly greeted me on remembering my first name. "Excellent, Matthew, excellent," he said, and I've never been so proud in all me puff. The waiters on duty, far outnumbering the clientele, and all clad in eyeball-cauterising white jackets in the tradition of Venice's fabled Harry's Bar, of which this is a stablemate, hinted at the same insolent over-familiarity. One fellow responded to every order with an encouraging "That's perfect!" Nothing was, and little flirted with bare adequacy. Had the cooking been half decent, pride of place on the dishonours board would go to a room - mosaic marble floor; Murano glass chandeliers; curvy brown walls and thick tan pillars; porthole-style mirror on the ceiling; bookcase packed with random volumes - which melds a Eurotrash paradise in Dubai with the first-class dining room of a Thirties ocean liner. If it seemed an enigma that only two others were seated on the irritatingly low chairs (I haven't sat that close to the ground since nursery school parents" evening) so close to Christmas, it was one the starters wasted no time in decrypting. The best thing about Ruth's tuna tartar, a large circle of fresh but spectacularly tasteless raw fish, was the delicate dressing (French rather than Italian, as if the ersatzness needed a boost) on the accompanying green salad. Paul was more bemused by than actively angry with his artichoke and avocado salad. "It's peculiar, but they've shredded the artichoke and used the avocado as a purée," he observed of a mound guarded at each flank by a tall shaving of Parmesan. I was expecting something spectacular, but this is terribly bland. I went for spaghetti pomodoro, the simplest of dishes and an excellent test of any Italian kitchen. The pasta was slightly al dente and fine, but there was little evidence of basil, and the tomatoes were so flavourless that the chef had made the usual, inevitably doomed rescue mission by oversalting to perdition. The second new worry was this. How to apologise to the utterly delightful couple who had bid handsomely to join me on a review at a charity auction (for the magnificent youth theatre company Chickenshed, of which I am a patron). "Ruth, I'm so sorry, I just... Paul, well, I..." I pitifully stammered. Look, can we please try this again? Somewhere good? Although they could not have been more gracious, their indulgence was tested by the main courses. Paul's "homemade" veal ravioli "alla Piemontese" was an offputtingly strange creation which looked like an omelette, contained exceedingly little meat and left a slightly rancid aftertaste. Ruth's monkfish came prettily covered with cherry tomatoes and capers, but in a blind tasting you wouldn't have stood an earthly of identifying it. My calf liver alla Veneziana was clumpingly heavy, overpowered by onion, as salty as the spaghetti, and served with greasy triangles of polenta better suited as substitute fried bread during a wildcat strike at Mother's Pride. "I'm so, so, sorry," I mumbled on, "I don't know what to say." I do know what to say about the puddings. So over-sugared were both, a gooey chocolate cake and a meringuey lemon cake, that the only punter who could have managed more than two mouthfuls would be a Type 1 diabetic in hypoglycaemic shock. And he or she might very well have opted for the coma. I suffered a shock myself when the bill arrived, and so trembly did my hands remain that, back in the car, it took minutes to do what had to be done on the smartphone. Eventually, and with deep regret, after one poignant last listen to a chorus that had acquired an unbearably savage ironic ring ("Things'll be great when you're... downtown/No finer place for sure... downtown"), Petula was duly deleted from the iTunes playlist.