The Square shows no merci to ‘fatty’ haute cuisine after revamp

The owner of a leading French restaurant in Mayfair has claimed the future of haute cuisine is a health-conscious menu with reduced fat and sugar.

Tomorrow Marlon Abela will re-open The Square, on Bruton Street, following a design and food overhaul, including a move away from the rich, often high-fat dishes of French fine dining. He told the Standard: “People are wanting to eat healthier. We do not want heavy stuff. That is the approach nowadays.

“That was challenging for our chefs. We want people to leave satisfied, but we wanted to create a very careful balance that means it’s not too much. The fat content is low, the food is the best quality in the world.”

One of London’s most lauded restaurants, The Square was previously run by two-Michelin-starred chef Philip Howard. He stepped down when it was sold to Marlon Abela Restaurant Corporation last year. Mr Abela, who also owns Mayfair restaurants Umu and The Greenhouse, said: “In this building there was the legacy, and we didn’t want to ignore that.

“It is a very different restaurant to before, but it has the food, the wine and the service you would expect. We have white tablecloths at The Square. They are not a symbol of stuffiness.”

Dishes on the four-course, £95 menu, from executive chef Clément Leroy, include John Dory served with celery, sea urchin and lychee and, for dessert, salt-baked pineapple with kombu and coconut. Mr Abela said: “Our pastry chef is Japanese. She has developed desserts that are using ingredients that are not as fattening.”

There have been a series of high-profile openings of French restaurants recently, including Claude Bosi’s Bibendum in Chelsea. Mr Abela said: “The notion that French has somehow disappeared in the past few years isn’t true. It has been very much there.

“Nowadays, it is very hard to distinguish between modern French, modern English and modern Italian. The evolution has been the same, it is all an intelligent approach to good food.”