CREED’s summer adventure in food and fragrance

Knowing the incredibly close links between the senses of taste and smell, we’re loving the way that clever chefs and mixologists are blurring the lines.

Perhaps the next logical step from gourmand scents was to always to flip that on its head and devise dishes and cocktails inspired by fragrances – but rarely has that been done more sense-tantalisingly than by the food and drink creatives at Grosvenor Square grill restaurant, 34 Mayfair.

Inspired by CREED’s celebrated Millésime Impérial – a quintessential Cologne, conjuring up the citrus groves and rugged coastal landscape of Sicily, with its notes of bergamot, mandarin and seasalt – are two innovations which can be enjoyed on the menu at 34 Mayfair until 31st August 2018. (Just around the corner from CREED’s flagship boutique at 99 Mount Street.

The first is a dessert (main photo), called Sicilian Garden (£12.50) – like sunshine on a plate, designed to transport you to the shores of the Med via a refreshing mandarin mousse with a light lemon jelly, placed on a sweet Italian meringue and finished with crushed biscotti and gold leaf.

The second is a Millésime cocktail (. Think: dry Manzanilla sherry blended with Sipsmith Summer cup, bergamot-infused Italicus liqueuer, lemon and mandarin in a light but refreshing, perfect summer tipple that’s poured over crushed ice and garnished with a dehydrated lemon dusted with gold and a sprit of rosemary.

Not a drinker? There’s a non-alcohcolic cocktail (£9) called ‘A Memoir of Cefalù’, combining Seedlip Spice, apple juice, mandarin, thyme, lemon and soda water.

Most gorgeously of all, perhaps, the frontage of the restaurant – at 34 South Audley Street (below) – has been florabundantly decorated to conjure up the fragrance, with guests entering via a Sicilian garden of citrus trees and lush foliage as they climb the steps to the restaurant.

And if you choose the drink or the cocktails, you’ll also receive a sample of Millésime Impérial – all the better to conjure up a memorable lunch or dinner, when you’re home again.

Not jetting off this summer? We can’t think of a better way to make up for it than to experience this delicious collaboration…

34 Mayfair 34 Grosvenor Square (entrance on South Audley Street), London W1K 2HD/020-3350 3434

34-restaurant.co.uk
creedfragrances.co.uk

Chin! Chin! Take a sip of Virgin Island Water

In the heart of Mayfair you can find a touch of Virgin Island summer, and it comes in an incredibly delicious form.
Grosvenor Square grill restaurant, 34 Mayfair, have teamed up with fine fragrance house Creed to create a taste sensation, inspired by their summer scent Virgin Island Water, in the form of a delectable dessert and coconut-y cocktail. We headed there on Wednesday night just to make sure they were scrumptious enough to share with you, and we can certify, they are.
Consisting of a sparkling citrus opening, a heady heart and a coconut base, Virgin Island Water captures the fresh warmth of a summer in the tropics of the Caribbean; a wonderfully tropical cocktail in fragrance form (it features in our Jet Set Discovery Box, which you can find here).
And now 34 Mayfair‘s incredibly talented Bar Manager Daniele Liberati has created a treat for the senses. He encapsulates Creed‘s fragrance in The Virgin Island Paradise Cocktail (see above), by combining a refreshing, sweet Leblon Cachaca, Italicus Rosolio di Bergamotto (yes, that’s a bergamot liqueur, and yes, we will be purchasing some), jasmine tea, coconut water – to give a hint of coconut flavour without the saccharine sweetness of coconut liqueurs – mandarin, lime and the final touch? A spritz of ylang ylang over the glass. If beachside hammocks came in cocktail form, this would be it. A holiday in a glass, and a fantastic representation of the sharp to sweet scent.
Then comes The White Bay dessert (see below). Created by Pastry Chef Alice Hall, it’s comprised of smoked pineapple flavoured with jasmine oil, mandarin segments, ylang ylang sorbet, a warm Piña Colada sauce with a creamy coconut mousse. And yes, it is just as delicious as it sounds. The tartness of the sorbet melts away leaving the honeyed sweetness of piña colada custard, the smokiness of the pineapple piercing through all the while.
Diners at the restaurant and trying the cocktail and dessert will also receive a sample of Creed Virgin Island Water fragrance and a complimentary fragrance consultation at the Creed boutique at 99 Mount Street.
The Virgin Island Paradise Cocktail and White Bay Dessert will be available until Sunday 10th September 2017; the Virgin Island Paradise Cocktail is £14 and the The White Bay Dessert is £10.75
Both can enjoyed at 34 Mayfair, 34 Grosvenor Square, London, W1K 2HD (open all day from lunchtime, Monday to Sunday – see their website for details)
34-restaurant.co.uk
creedfragrances.co.uk
Written by Carson Parkin-Fairley
Slider image: Unsplash/Sébastien Jermer