Dining with Marilyn: lunch at Savoy Grill

Marilyn Monroe watched over our table at Savoy Grill, at least in portrait form. Our server told us we were sitting in her favourite spot, directly beneath her likeness. The timing could hardly have been better: this summer, the National Portrait Gallery’s Marilyn Monroe: A Portrait is marking the centenary of the actor’s birth, while The Savoy’s own history records her visiting the hotel in 1956 during the making of The Prince and the Showgirl.

By then, the Grill was already nearly seven decades old, part of The Savoy since the hotel opened beside impresario Richard D’Oyly Carte’s Savoy Theatre in 1889. Performers, producers and writers soon made it part of Theatreland’s social machinery. Hollywood stars and political heavyweights followed, and it became somewhere to be seen, with just enough discretion to make that seem accidental.The room carries that history without relying on sepia. Redesigned by award-winning design studio Afroditi in 2023, it draws on 1920s Hollywood Regency: deep-red velvet booths, handmade peacock-feather tiles and a scalloped pewter bar join the retained Swarovski chandeliers, while warm light catches metallic and glass details and the portraits of former guests. It is dark and grand, as a Grill at The Savoy ought to be, and easy to settle into.

That ease began with something as humble as bread and butter. The malted sourdough arrived warm, fresh and fluffy beneath a crunchy crust, with savoury, salty Marmite brown butter, which our server said also contained some of the sourdough starter. In my youth, my parents once threatened me with bread-and-butter sandwiches as punishment, unaware I loved them; at Savoy Grill, the same combination made for a hopeless punishment but a very good sign of what was to come.

My tomato and red pepper gazpacho was excellent and exactly right for the heights of summer, while the chicken and mushroom terrine went down just as well. Superstar Chef Gordon Ramsay is famed for his signature Beef Wellington, a dish he has said would be his last-supper menu, so ours arrived with high expectations attached. The thick slice of pink fillet, ringed with mushroom and pastry, and served with pomme purée, truffle and red wine jus, looked every inch the headline act. Across the table, my guest’s slow-cooked pollock with vadouvan, sesame and leek dashi came close to stealing the scene.

Palmer & Co La Réserve Champagne and Timo Vermentino came on our sommelier’s recommendation, and he was right about both. By dessert, his final choice, GD Vajra’s 2025 Moscato d’Asti, was in the glass beside the Amalfi lemon tarts, the raspberry sorbet on the plate almost as vivid as the red velvet around us. The same attentiveness ran through the wider service; because nothing ever seemed too much trouble, I gradually stopped noticing the grandeur around us. If, like me, you have spent years considering a first visit, take this as the nudge to finally book.

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