A touch of class
IT WAS logical when, about 10 years ago, David Levin opened his Parisian-style Le Metro hotel, that he should make use of the basement as a wine bar. It is almost next door to his Capital Hotel and just a few paces from one of the side entrances to Harrods.
It was a success from the start. It is small, with no more than 45 seats, which possibly explains why it has a lower profile than other parts of Levin's small empire which includes The Greenhouse in Mayfair.
You might almost call it one of its owner's best-kept secrets. The food masterminded by the renowned kitchens of the Capital is inexpensive and manages to be simple in the best tradition of French brasseries. It is cooked with more finesse than you might expect to find in such establishments.
To give an idea of the style of the place, customers pay £3.95 for a warm salad of new potatoes and Toulouse sausage, £5.80 for grilled herrings with sun-dried tomatoes and olives, £7.95 for a rib-eye steak with Bearnaise sauce and sauté potatoes, and £2.95 for fresh Bakewell tart.
But it is for its wine service that the bed and breakfast hotel deserves special mention in this column, particularly in our campaign to improve and expand the service of wine by the glass.
In this respect it is a pioneer, being one of the first establishments in London to install a system which allowed wine to be sold by the glass without deterioration of quality.
Levin installed one of the first French Cruover systems in the UK. The system holds 10 bottles of wine which are kept in perfect condition, chilled or at room temperature. As the wine is drawn from the bottle, the machine replaces it by an inert gas which prevents oxidisation.
Wines which do not normally lend themselves to occasional pouring may be sold by the glass. The process is simply explained on the wine list which emphasises the attractions and the freshness of the wines listed by the glass.
The price per bottle is listed alongside the glass price, though it does not say how many glasses (in fact five) the establishment allows per bottle.
Wine by the glass clearly works at Le Metro. There is no need for any kind of preservation system for Champagne because the turnover is so high.
The bar is happy with having no more than five white and five reds available in addition to the list. More might confuse customers and deter them from buying bottles or half bottles. In the evening, sales by the bottle are the norm. As the full list is excellently priced and full of interest, this is understandable.
Wines by the glass nevertheless account for something around 15-20% of the drinks take. There is no doubt that it is a powerful selling tool for the wine bar, and helps to identify its style. Given changes in technology, it is predictable, however, that Le Metro will replace the current system of dispensing with a less expensive, more flexible and more modern system of the sort now widely used in London and elsewhere in the UK.
Levin remains committed to the principle of wine by the glass because it makes it easier for customers to experiment and, above all, to go beyond low-priced "house wines". On top of that, wine buffs who would not otherwise become customers are likely to be attracted by a glass of something special. The Metro has used the system most effectively to sell wines on particular themes: a vintage, a region, a grape variety or a chÆ'teau.
