Pretty on the outside

Dining at the new British Bankers Club in Menlo Park was like finally getting a date with the prom queen. You looked forward to it and when you drove up, she looked enchanting, but within a few minutes you realized she had nothing interesting to offer. She was a superficial beauty, all glam and no depth.

Rob Fischer, who owns Peninsula Creamery, Reposado and Gravity Wine Bar in Palo Alto and Scratch in Mountain View, put loads of money and nearly three years into refurbishing British Bankers Club. The result is visually inviting. The handsome brick building, constructed in 1925, has housed a bank, the Menlo Park City Hall, the police department and jail, with the public library upstairs. Most recently, it was a busy bar and restaurant of the same name that closed several years ago after two employees were arrested for sexually assaulting two women in an upstairs room and its liquor license was suspended.

In the spacious main dining room, the huge windows have been accentuated and a long wood bar highlights an opposite wall. The kitchen is glassed in so it’s visible, but you can’t yell at the chef. The space is decidedly minimalist, with a black-and-white tile floor, a mesh divider that separates the bar from a grill, wood-top tables, upholstered chairs and a long upholstered banquette that lines the two walls under the windows.

The space’s mezzanine has been expanded, an ideal space for gatherings. Best of all is the rooftop bar and grill, a snazzy spot that opens to the public at 4 p.m. and is also available for private parties. If that isn’t enough, there is patio dining in the plaza shared with Cafe Borrone and Kepler’s Books.

The menu had me salivating: 10 starters, a half-dozen soups and salads, 10 entrées, a half-dozen tempting desserts, and a solid list of libations from beer and wine to tequilas and single malt scotches. All of the elements were there. Alas, the food was not.

Cornmeal fried oysters ($16) was a concoction of deviled egg gribiche sauce (made of capers, egg, Dijon, olive oil and vinegar), pancetta jerky and frisée salad. Why the pancetta was made into a jerky is a mystery, because it was unchewable. The vinaigrette over the frisée was too salty, a recurring problem on many dishes. The oysters were so over-fried, I didn’t recognize them as oysters. They could have been clams, shrimp, mussels, anything. They were bone dry, over-breaded and underwhelming.

The smoked salmon deviled eggs ($15), with salmon caviar, radish, frisée salad, sherry vinaigrette, fried capers and dill, simply needed something to breathe life into them. There were too many similar flavors and textures. It was a pretty dish but utterly bland.

The asparagus fries ($15), breaded with parmesan and parsley, were a worthwhile appetizer. The spears were fat and crisp, neither over-breaded nor overcooked. The accompanying lemon mascarpone and Aleppo pepper dipping sauce was spicy, cool and creamy.

House-made ricotta gnocchi ($16) swam in a cacio e pepe broth (black pepper and salty pecorino cheese) with charred onion and a pesto sauce that made the dish excessively salty. Globs of salty pesto were dotted over the delicate gnocchi and broth. If that wasn’t enough, more cheese had been grated over the top, adding still another layer of saltiness. It was difficult to know if the gnocchi were good. All I can report is that they were pillowy, not rubbery, and I drank a lot of water.

The slow-cooked Corvina sea bass ($29) came with zucchini noodles, white truffle oil and roasted tomato-lemon ragout. The ragout was the only item on the plate with flavor. The presentation was appealing, the portion generous, but the fish was overcooked, bone-dry, flavorless and not worth eating. The zucchini noodles were loads of fun, though.

Not every selection was off-target. The mushroom and foie gras agnolotti ($25) was a hit. Agnolotti are small, stuffed pasta squares, like ravioli. At the British Bankers Club, they came as oversized rectangles filled with creamy mushrooms. The slice of foie gras was perfectly cooked and the truffle in the truffle-parmesan cream didn’t stifle the other ingredients. It was a well-executed dish.

For dessert, the roasted pear gingerbread cake ($8) was luscious, with a cap of cinnamon creme anglaise and whipped crème fraîche. The apple streusel buttermilk cake ($8) was a lovely dish of frangipane, crème anglaise, kumquats and whipped cream.

The chai panna cotta ($8) was served with baklava rollups and honey yogurt, drizzled with spiced vincotto (grapes slow-simmered until syrupy). The flavors were good but the panna cotta was more like thick yogurt than the light, silky custard it should have been.

Service was attentive if impersonal, though at lunch one day, I wasn’t three bites into my appetizer when the entree arrived. The waiter tried to slide it on the table despite seeing I was still eating the first course. I sent it back. There was no excuse, since there were but a half-dozen diners in the restaurant.

British Bankers Club has all the elements of a destination restaurant, but the back of the house is a problem. It seems as if the kitchen is following recipes without any idea how the finished products should taste. It was food by rote rather than food with emotion.

Dinner for two, one glass of wine each, with tip, averaged $175.

British Bankers Club

555 Santa Cruz Ave., Menlo Park

650-382-3191

Britishbankersclub.com

Hours: Monday-Friday from 11:30 am., Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m.

Reservations: yes

Credit cards: yes

Parking: street

Alcohol: full bar

Happy hour: no

Corkage: $25

Children: yes

Takeout: yes

Outdoor dining: yes

Noise level: high when busy

Bathroom cleanliness: excellent