Making no attempt to disguise its exclusive atmosphere and high prices, the restaurant at Kingly Club St Martins Lane is the opposite of an understatement.

The Venue
Kyashii is the basement restaurant of the Kingly Club St Martins Lane, sister location to the established Soho nightspot. The new location has expanded things a bit into three levels: a ground floor bar, exclusive mezzanine area and Kyashii below ground. The location is less than ideal, a venue on St Martins Lane where nothing seems to last for more than a year or so, except for Stringfellows across the road, of course. They’ve created a little outdoor area with some nice-looking tables and large plants, and it’s a pity the view isn’t much more than wandering tourists and speeding cabs.

Once inside though, you’ll soon forget the neighbours. It looks as if a very large amount of money has gone into the venue’s completion – the cost of upkeep of the multiple aquariums alone must be astounding. Everything looks shiny and pristine, with white laquered tables, white leather chairs and sofas and neon blue and yellow lighting – white, yellow and blue being the repeated colour theme, aside from the mezzanine area where everything is black.

Kyashii is located downstairs within a warren of nearly pitch black hallways with dark, lush carpeting. First on the left is the sunken Blue Room, with three walls made up of enormous aquariums swimming with blue and yellow fish. The White Room, next down the hallway and also down a step or two, is larger, with one fish tank and round, raised lights on the other walls. A few more twists and turns in the dark hall and you’ll come upon the chef’s table, a large white booth encased in glass, overlooking the kitchen.

The Atmosphere
There’s an air of exclusivity to the Kingly Club and you can’t help but feel like you’re being sized up when you walk into the venue. Once into the restaurant, however, the staff are reassuringly friendly, chatty and competent. This is not the kind of place to wander into off the street after an afternoon of errands – best to book a table and make it into the kind of event that the atmosphere demands.

The Food
As you might expect from the name of the restaurant, the menu at Kyashii is Japanese, but with nods to French and other cuisines. Nearly every item on the menu sounds immensely complicated, with a series of different ingredients; indeed, when your food is presented, everything is immaculate down to the tiniest detail and looks like it was incredibly complicated to prepare. And it should be, for the prices – a staggering £42.50 for two courses and £52.50 for three, plus supplements for the really expensive stuff like wagyu beef with lobster, truffles and foie gras (an extra £45).

Things kick off with a tiny but perfectly formed amuse bouche of seared tuna squares. For starters, the Kaiso is a salad of langoustines and three different types of seaweed, with batons of daikon (Japanese radish), cubes of tofu, almost adorably miniature mushrooms and a dressing made of Cabernet Sauvignon vinegar and yuzu (a Japanese citrus fruit). For all the fuss, the flavours are great: the dressing is pleasantly tart, the seaweed has nice and firm texture and the langoustines are large and succulent. The gyoza is a bit more indulgent – three sizeable dumplings made with wagyu beef and foie gras and a swish of white truffle cream sauce. They taste rich and moreish, and combined with a wobbly circle of teriyaki jelly and a sushi rice ball topped with a carpaccio-style slice of raw wagyu beef, there’s good combination of strong flavours.

Mains include Suzuki, a Chilean sea bass dish, with a big circle of the fish topped with savoury smoked bonito flakes and resting on a bed of thin-stemmed broccoli. The fish is thick, meaty and flakey, but unfortunately the outside tastes a bit more cooked than the inside, which is room temperature. A side order of potato gratin cake has a great texture, with multiple layers of thin potato and a sweet, cheesy topping. Sushi is also available, in the form of sashimi (£8 - £16 for three pieces), a selection recommended by the chef (£20 - £70) and rolls from £7.50 - £15. Like the other dishes, the sushi rolls are intricate and complicated, with variations on classics like California and spicy tuna rolls – no wasabi or soy sauce, though. The Iseebi maki is an inside-out roll made up of cubes of tender lobster surrounded by pink Champagne-marinated foie gras, with a sweet, slightly boozy sauce. Their spicy tuna roll (Maguro maki) is actually wrapped in rice paper, with grains of rice and tuna inside and a slightly spicy ginger vinegar dipping sauce – very fresh and the flavours are much less complicated than the dish looks.

Before dessert you’re presented with a shot glass of a sorbet-like pineapple ice with large grains of sugar. From the dessert menu, the Nashi Pear Cake comes recommended and is a good dish if you don’t like your puddings too sweet or sugary: the cake is moist and rich, with soft pears on top covered with a hard sugar glaze. On the side are perfectly round scoops of almost sour sake sorbet on top of a row of more of those soft pear slices. The green tea donuts would be a bit nicer if they tasted like they had green tea in them, instead of just being sprinkled with a bitter green tea powder, but the apple compote filling is thick and sweet. They’re accompanied by thin rectangles of white jelly with a sour apple filling and a scoop of cool, icy apple sorbet. Petit fours (available with coffee or tea after the meal for £7) include a meltingly rich white chocolate covered in the previously mentioned green tea powder, two miniature cherry macaroons in a cheerful pale pink colour and a Turkish-delight style jellied cube.

The Drink
An immense, 32 page wine list starts off at £7 a glass and £22 a bottle and it’s hard to imagine there being a variety of wine that’s not included. There are three pages dedicated to Champagne (£40 to £875 a bottle) and there are several sakes available as well. From the list of white wines, the £30 South African Chardonnay (Ataraxia Mountain Vineyards, 2006) is sweet, rich but well-balanced. Cocktails, including a potent Tutti Frutti (made with Absolut Ruby, Creme de Fraise de Bois, apple and lemon juice, watermelon, raspberries and peach bitters) are served in the ground floor bar. Prices are about £9, but beware the service charge.

The Last Word
Outlandish and expensive? Yes, but there’s definitely a market for that in London and if you have the money to burn then the Kingly Club and Kyashii is the place to do it. The food is good, impeccable in its presentation, but a few less pricey options or a cheaper set lunch menu would mean that more people could have the chance to try it.

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