Second in the occasional alternative review series : Prompt Corner, Montpelier Road, Brighton
Sean Connery, John Inman, Robbie Williams, Barry from Eastenders. What do these four have in common? Well, apart from being slightly camp and having woefully poor singing voices, as patrons past their signed photos adorn the walls of the underground treasure trove that is Brighton's Prompt Corner. Every conceivable wall space (and indeed ceiling space) is covered. There are some continuity errors, such as the pride of place photo of Jimmy Hendrix who died 6 years before the restaurant opened. The other thing to strike us upon entering was the smell of gin and the fact that everybody that works there is leathered (as in "drunk, slaughtered, plastered" - not "attired in") beyond all known record.
We'll start with the lady behind the bar - we'll call her Joan (and we'll call her a lady) - who sort of glides around behind the bar in a stupor. Average pint pulling time 83 seconds. She makes you wonder if in fact she has feet, or is just moved around by some elaborate pulley system, or indeed if she is alive at all, or just preserved/pickled in home made wine.
Ken (as we'll call him) our maitre'd, shows us to our table and hands us our menus. It's fair to say he looks like he's put a few away, and the fact he is drinking sherry from a pint pot does nothing to dissuade us of that opinion. His arms start shaking like a couple of erect chihuahuas who have just watched The Omen trilogy on a dark misty night,and confirms things once and for all (a mental note is made to avoid the soup).
The food, while big on quantity is pretty much average on quality, and I get the impression that the vegetarian options are in fact just the meat dishes with the biggest lumps removed, and the sauce sucked out by Joan. Now while I frequently endorse that vegetarians clearly have some mental disorder (how on earth can you not like sausages?), they don't deserve to be treated as an afterthought.
The dish the restaurant seem most proud of is the garlic potatoes, and when one of our party asks for the recipe, Joan offers with martini riddled breath - 'Potatoes and garlic butter.' We would never have guessed. She even wrote it down for us, although the next day I looked at the paper and assumed I'd uncovered some coded message written in Japanese and sent it to the Imperial War Museum (where it is still exhibited to this day - really).
The toilet is a thing of beauty, located outside by the bins and of a size that can only suggest it was procured from the set of Time Bandits. The smell is akin to that of a tube station at midnight and there is very much "standing room only."
Paying for our meal seems fraught with danger too, and we get the impression that Ken would just prefer it if we slipped away quietly to save him the trouble of all those fiddly numbers and bits of paper. I think through luck rather than judgement we get away with paying £15 less than we should have done, but he is keen to get us out. Two minutes later we are gone, sucked back into the heart of Brighton and seemingly a million miles away.
One goes to Prompt Corner for the atmosphere not the food, and like great sex it is best enjoyed in groups (although not necessarily with your family).
Go to Prompt Corner, and if you've been go again, and if you are always going go some more. It's good. The service is relaxed and informal (in a drunk sort of way)
Ave. price for 3 course meal for 2 and bottle of wine £50 (ours was more like £80 but we have been known to enjoy the odd drop of wine)
www.promptcorner.com
Booking at weekends strongly recommended - especially for the toilet
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