The man is almost too beautiful to be a chef.

As we ended the meal, I told our waiter to give our compliments to him. “Oh you know Ollie?” he said. I said “No, but I read about him last night, five star game changer to paraphrase Fay, and we are tempted to agree.”. Shortly after, the chef came over to greet us. He seemed a little nervous meeting paying customers but he was clearly enthusiastic with his new restaurant. He had a blue pinstriped butcher’s apron around him, but wore a thin white loosely hanging tee underneath, giving us a glimpse of his his well-endowned (and furry) man-chest. No heavily threaded chef robes here. I noted his well manicured beard. “I heard somebody knows my first name, so I thought I’d come over to say hello.” he said.

His name is Ollie Dabbous (phonetically Dabboo). Remember that. You’ll be hearing a lot more of him from now on. He is but one of the talents which represent the future of British cooking. Ollie started as a protege at Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir before travelling around the world to stint in the kitchens of some of the most written about chefs in Europe. Like Andoni Luis Aduriz, Claude Bosi, Pierre Gagnaire, Heston B, Rene R, Wylie Dufresne, before moving to lead Agnar Sverisson’s under-appreciated Texture. (I hear what you’re saying – another young chef’s CV that can match these glittery restaurants is Ben Spalding. And maybe the Young Turks fellas.)

That was about two years ago, since then he’s done Loft Project pop-ups and been trying to secure enough funding to get his solo project off the ground, but now he has finally done it. Simply christened Dabbous. Can we say his cooking is French-Icelandic? How about North-West European? Let’s say it’s French-Icelandic.

I’d have to agree with Fay about Ollie’s cooking being influenced by Le Fooding movement. All these young guys seem to be doing it. A style of cooking that is artsy, liberated and inversely-pretentious. I wouldn’t say modern or even post-modern nor is it breakthrough or even new, but perhaps just a differnt way of eating. My personal view is that Le Fooding is the culinary parallel of the Surrealist movement of the 20s-30s. You know, Cartier-Bresson and Dali, the decoupling of high art and high society, etc.

I think restaurants are going through a period of growing pains now, and some kind of post-fine diner is forming (if it’s not already happened) where something between a bistro and a traditional table-clothed starred restaurant is emerging. Food may be bastardised re-interpretations of what the chef has experienced in his own travels. Whatever right, what do I know, I’m just an idiot blogger. Trying to describe influences is moot unless we actually sit down to ask the chef where his ideas come from. But one thing is for sure: Bistronomy is very cool, it’s a way of eating/cooking that has already permeated European food culture.

Let’s leave ambiance to the last leg of this post, and go straight to the menu. ALC prices are competitively, starters at £5-7 , mains for £11-14 and puds at £6, the 6 course taster is £49. But you’ll probably be interested in their 4 course set lunch for £24. By inspection, it seems like the set is a subset of the ALC, rather than a menu comprised of cheaper ingredients.

Bread. Freshly baked and Warm.

And bagged and dated too to keep it so. A charming start to the meal, setting the tone for the laid-back service.

I went for Friday lunch with Mr Mystery (who cannot be named for legal reasons, but really he has eaten with me for most of my review meals) on the 3rd of Feb, at which point, the restaurant had only been opened for exactly 2 weeks. Ollie was in the kitchen, and we decided to do four courses each, one from the set and the other plucked from the ALC.

Starters.

Beef tartar with cigar oil, whisky and rye (Set).

Well would you look at that. I’ve never seen a healthier looking tartare. Quail egg replaced by tiny gold coloured petals, capers by monks beard and powdered rye for crisp bread. Was it good? No, it was better, it was bloody fantastic. Mysterious thought it was simply illuminating.

I tried a spoonful and thought the same, and wanted one for myself. The tartare was chopped to a mushy mince, it tasted raw and pure but also floral and herby. It did remind me of negi-toro (bashed tuna belly), and so was more Japanese than French, or perhaps more Scandinavian than Japanese actually. Only the slightest hint of smoke, a little minty and delicate aftertaste of fruit & sugar. Yeah, we thought it was fucking great, it’s absolutely reversed-engineered tartare. (Sorry Thomas, turns out I can’t help myself after all.)

Coddled free range hen egg with woodland mushrooms and smoked butter, £7

Fay and Guy have already dedicated a couple of column inches to this dish, turning it into the poster-dish for the restaurant. It looks the part yes? Whisked egg served in its own shell, coddled in a bowl of hay. Full marks for presentation. What kind of redolence are you evoking? Are you standing over a hen’s nest with a silver spoon ready to crack an egg (still warm from her bum) open? You sicko, the hen is behind you.

Look at that huh, ain’t it great? The textures were amazing, a golden-hued viscous custard cream consistency. A real visual delight, served warm, my palate coddled on to every spoonful of before it was forced down the rest of my system. Breakfast in a shell? It could even do with some soldiers maybe. It reminded me a little of the reverse of Atherton’s fluidised english breakfast, but it’s much less pretentious, and is a more superior dish altogether.

This dish is a talented chef flexing those cooking muscles. It’s the best scrambled eggs & mushrooms I’d ever had. An organic, return to nature kind of feeling. And it’s refreshing that this isn’t sous-vided, slow cooked or an onsen egg. I loved it to bits, but Mark loved it more than I did. Opps.

Fish

Grilled monkfish cheeks, squid ink, virgin rapeseed oil mayonnaise, Jerusalem artichoke (Set)

Look at that glistening translucency right under the grill lines: That there is the epitome of perfectly executed undercooking-tethering-on-the-edge-of-being-cooked technique. On the surface, its a simple construct, but it’s four high impact elements which are designed to work toward high impact unified umami. Which they do by the way. Squid-inked flavoured monk fish (serious), with perfect slithery textures (approaching sous-videness). A side of simply roasted (maybe) and richly flavoured Jerusalem Artichokes provided texture, a perfectly whippy for seasoning. Considering the difficulty of monkfish, I thought this illustrated how good the cooking really was. Fundamentals, something often sacrificed for creativity is ever present here.

And this is part of a £24 four course set – Amazing. What do you think? Wouldn’t be out of place on a Le Dauphin menu at all yes?

Roast king crab with warm buttermilk and hispi cabbage, £12.

This blew me eight ways to a castle full of fire breathing dragons who eat lobsters for breakfast. Again, let’s start with the superb texture of the cubes of crab claws – absolutely spot-on, remarkably tender, fresh, juicy, as perfect as crab can be cooked. How this kind of texture was achieved by roasting was beyond me. Deus Ex Machina perhaps, the unseen force that guides the chef’s hand may be beyond human comprehension.

The buttermilk sauce was even better. Textures were somewhere between a milkshake and olive oil. Flavours, a little tangy, a little like sour cream, a little like milk and a little bit like regurgitated hollandaise, I know this seems like a strange description, but really it was absolutely brilliant. This really is bistronomy done right. That buttermilk coating for the crab was nothing short of sheer genius. Ollie didn’t just set the lake on fire, he dropped a nuked in there and everything went thermo-nuclear.

Meat

Braised veal cheek with spelt, mixed alliums, and a light St. Gall broth , £11.

I can see your eyes rolling – yeah it’s foam but who cares, it tastes great! In fact, the veal cheek was so good, Mark gobbled it all up and then apologised before I had a chance to dip my spoon in. I did try the rest of the innocent foam with the wheat: Calming, pure, Nordic-like, kind of healthy.

Barbecued iberico pork, savoury acorn praline, turnip tops, homemade apple vinegar, £14.

I chose the iberico pork loin. I cut into it and my hand trembled – fucking wow. Dense but soft, juicy but chewable, pink but cooked all the way through. How did he do it? There wasn’t any hint of smoke, how did he bbq a side of pork so gently? We probed our waiter: “Water bath? Ban Marie? Steam? Magic?”. Technically speaking, this is a work of art. Wait? Isn’t that an oxymoron? The praline was like a kind of rocky-road biscuit base. Nutty and caramel in terms of flavour. There doesn’t seem to be any salt, butter, pepper, red wine in this one. And again, the dish felt (not just tasted) so natural, so organic, so refreshing, a little French, a little Scandinavian and nothing like any of it at all. The bottom line: Quality ingredients cooked to absolute perfection. This was almost as good as Ash PM’s pork chop at Dinner at the Mandarin Oriental. Almost.

Puds

Barley flour sponge soaked in red tea, Tahitian vanilla cream, £7.

Or Rum baba without the alcohol. The sponge cake was wet with tea instead, a whipped Tahitian vanilla (truthfully, I can’t tell how Tahitian Vanilla is actually different) being lighter than Chantilly.

Chocolate and virgin hazelnut oil ganache, basil moss, sheeps’ milk ice cream, £7.

I ended on this stumble-upon recreation of a conifer forest floor on a plate. The chocolate log was actually quite lovely. It crackled like what I imagine a dried dead log of wood would feel like, if I was to bite into one, I suppose. Honestly, I didn’t really like the herb flavours (basil and.. douglas fir?) but thank goodness he didn’t use ice shavings in this one. I’ve had better forest-floor type natural puddings, like the stuff at North Road for example. This looked better than it tasted, the only dish I thought was average through the meal. The barley sponge was clearly better.

We both had a cocktail each (I had a great Saceraz) and we paid £90 in total. That’s great value for money.

Portions were a little small, but I think considering the cooking, it’s justified for its price. You’d have to have a four to five course meal to fill up, in which case, it’s a no brainer to choose the £49 six courser for the voracious lady and the £24 for the gym bunny fella. In a way its a good thing, the small dishes give you the opportunity to sample his range of dishes.

Yes. Dabbous is a revelation, it’s probably still a work in progress given it’s only 2 weeks old, but its a bloody amazing work in progress. On the other hand, I think it may perpetually be a work in progress. The cooking is stripped down and there is a raw energy driving this restaurant forward. Each dish is a thoughtful if efficient construct of few ingredients which work together to achieve umami.

I think the cavernous wood and steel cube-shaped room is utilitarian and a little blade runner-esque. It certainly feels like it belongs in a metropolis, but equally it looks like it could be perched atop a summit overlooking a valley somewhere in central Europe or Japan.

This restaurant feels young, fresh and bold. I think we’ve seen a small number of restaurants in London which have tried to bring about the next step change in ‘fine dining’ or perhaps to rationalise alternatively dining (which may qualify as edible art) as a viable business. Concepts seem to bog down many. But with Dabbous, I feel there is a clear focus. The food certainly entralls and Ollie may be the one who come closests in transitioning this type of uber-cool dining to the mainstream (if there is such a thing as mainstream haute cuisine..).

I get the feeling there’s a lot more brave ideas swirling around this young chef’s mind (who is barely older than me.. if not actually younger) and that Dabbous may evolve into an exciting beacon of culinary progress. Maybe. Crucially, I enjoyed the meal because I thought the fundamentals were spot-on. Ollie and crew understand the importance of balanced flavours and the nebulous zone of undercooking. As I’ve pointed out before, I believe that punters go to restaurants to witness how chefs display their perfect triple flip-triple toe loop landings on plates. Good ingredients are obviously important, but a good procurement policy should only serve to compliment great cooking and not the other way around. There’s only one dish with truffle on this menu, and it’s served as part of mash. Potatoes and truffle – you may think ‘cutting edge’ but there couldn’t be a more classic pairing. For me, these restaurants intrigue because the people behind it appear to be global high cooking otaku who build their ideas on the foundations of the established foundries, but who come out with something completely new on the other side.

What is that old adage about the probability of great chefs who can cook anything and turn it into something delicious. Ollie Dabbous can probably do this… but I think he’s also spent a lot of time working on a set of winning recipes, which are er, winning over people like me.

At the moment, it looks like items on his set lunch (£24, ridic value for money) are subsets of his ALC. At least in these beginning days, it seems like the restaurant is offering a genuine discount for lunchers. As I understand it, the phone-lines are already bonkers, and their books are filling up quicker than they can punch it in.

Some of you will be bewildered by this post-modernism, others are still mourning the slow death (I am in some ways) of the table-cloth army of the macaroon go-getter, but I think there will be some of you who will absolutely love (Ollie) Dabbous. We celebrate the arrival of the Fooding spirit in London. Yeah man, it’s not just the four senses of taste, it’s the holistic feeling, total food, total mind and body experience, ohh … you feel it yet?

But it’s still early days, let’s coddle the chef, and shield him from hype and the pressures associated with expectation.

For me, I loved it enough to book a return visit with the missus for next weekend as we settled the bill. I have a promotion to celebrate (yes, I still have a day job). Maybe I’ll bump into you? If so, please feel free to give the Chinese fella a hug from behind.

Dabbous
Modern, £40pp
39 Whitfield St, W1T 2SF
Tel : 0207 323 1544
Tube: Goodge Street

Reviews: Fay ; Guy ; Sbib ; Ray

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the RSS feed.

Who comes up with all this fiction just for a restaurant? This is the persuasive language Oliver’s people have generated for his latest project:

“Ours is a union of ideas, traditions, and of people.”

“Where wood-fired flatbreads meet great British flavours.”

Lookintomyeyeslookintomyeyes.

What’s with the wonky name – why not just call it Union or Union Jack. Is this meant to be ironic? I don’t get it. The ambiguity with the plural form (or misplaced punctuation) is the restaurant equivalent of the 2012 Olympics logo.

In spite of the spin, this really is just a pizzeria. It’s billed as some kind of ground breaking bastardisation of the humble Italian pie, by the hand of Jamie’s very Bri’ish style and nicknamed as Flatbreads. As if one could reinvent something simply by calling it something else. I do like the ‘Gary Baldy’ biscuit, however. I’d like to think these concepts were the result of a complicated brain storming session by a think tank of consultants locked in a meeting room and eating nothing but pizza to precipitate ideas.

Back in the real world, this union is a partnership between Jamie Oliver and Pizza Maestro Chris Bianco. This Central St Giles location being the pilot for a upcoming franchise, which (presumably) pending the success of this branch, will spread throughout London and the rest of the country in the next couple of years.

Bad naming aside, I think the rest of this restaurant however is brilliantly conceived. The decor is spot-on. Few restaurants come in pink, this one is so colourfully retro, it feels like a fifities diner which has been lifted out from Archie comics. I especially like the cinema billboard style overhead menus above the open plan kitchen. Speaking of which, you can sit by the bar and watch the chefs stuff the wood-fire ovens with bubbling pizza dough. Picture this : solo dining, malted milkshake, by the bar, reading 1Q84 Part III. And then Betty Draper walks in wearing a neat black and blue pokka dot, body hugging, knee high dress with a big blue bow as a belt. She decides to locks eyes with you, as she undoes her elbow length white gloves. (Huh?)

It’s clear that Jamie’s people have astutely noted the current trend of un-ceremony and retro flair. This place is so back to the future, so infectiously a happy place, that you can’t help but smile when you come in. Service was so terribly friendly and forward that I just wanted to give my waitress a big hug every time she brought me some food. She was blonde, was very nice to me without crossing waiter-customer lines and she may have fooled me into believing it was.. love.

By-Catch Fish Fingers & Tartare Sauce, £5 with Roobarb & Custard, £5.50.

The Captain would’ve been proud of these fish fingers, flaky, crumbly, can’t say they were best but they were nostalgic with gooey batter coating the undersides of the crust.

The real eye-whopper was the roobarb and custard – great drink! I can hardly believe it contains alcohol, but apparently it is made with Chase’s Rhubarb Liqueur. That’s a distillery in Hereford which makes vodka from potatoes which they grow themselves. An interesting story, they sold their first bottles in 2008. For this liqueur, they laced their vodka with rhubarb from the area. The rest of the drink was finished like a spritzer with Union Jack’s in-house apple and cinnamon drink. It’s like an apple strudle flavoured cream soda! Addictive.

Flatbread, Oxtail & brisket, slow braised in Worcestershire sauce, Sparkenhoe Red Leicester, watercress & fresh horseradish £12

Ah, here we go, the flatbread. Well, well, isn’t she a sight for sore eyes. The Betty Draper of pizzas, look at those beautiful burnt spots and the perfect oval shapeliness, the tussled watercress with flaming red stems. Is your blood racing yet? The flatbread was still sizzling when it came. Freshly grated horseradish produced stinging eye-watering fumes and breathing in all the flavours nearly knocked me out. The dough is somewhere between the juicy Franco Manco dough and the powdery Pizza East semolina base, I liked it fine. Generous flosses of tender oxtail and brisket with full bodied winter stew flavour was extremely pleasing. I have to say, the sharpness of the melted red leicester did give the impression that this was not just a pizza, but that it had beenlocalised as an ‘English’ pizza. I gobbled it up very quickly, and I really wanted to have another one.

Retro Arctic Roll, £4 and Home made Earl Grey Tea Ice Cream, £1.50 per scoop.

Oh man, pure nostalgia. This was a treat for me when I was growing up. I think my mum bought the Bird Eyes ones which came with this cream flavoured ice cream centre and thin swirls of jam. This version is just as frozen, but has additional swirls of chocolate ice cream. The blackberry jam it came smothered in, with was very good, but the frozen pudding was no where close to replicating my favourite memories.

The home-made earl grey tea and biscuit ice cream, on the other hand, was bloody fantastic. It’s frozen cream tea and biscuits! Served in a frosted copper ice cream cup! Also retro! The best £1.50 I’ve spent all year, this is the dessert of the year for me.

But here’s an idea, an alternate version of the artic roll with the excellent earl grey tea ice cream. I recommend they call it “Kang’s flamin’ tea flavour arctic roll”.

I paid exactly £30, plus an espresso. Service was at my discretion so I put in an extra £2.

Ok I admit. The think tank wins. The British theme is a charmer, I’m totally into the Union thing now. The flatbreads are of excellent quality, and the British toppings do work. Oxtail, horseradish work just as well as egg and potatoes on pizza. I think that stronger English hard cheeses when melted produce some game changing flavours, as compared with relatively mild mozzarella. I am intrigued with the potential of the other choices. The Old spot with pork shoulder, quince and stilton sounds like it could be immense. So too the seafood option of cornish sardines with fennel.

His other partnership, Barbecoa was shambles, but this one is going to be a winning franchise. It’s very likeable and upbeat, I predict Union Jacks invading the high street, and eventually superseding Pizza Express.

The Gist of It

Union Jacks
The Flatbread formerly known as Pizza. £25pp
4 Central St. Giles Piazza
LONDON
WC2H 8AB
Tel : 0203 597 7888
Tube: Tottenham Court Road

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

I continue to be amazed by the lack of internet champions for this terrific neighbourhood restaurant. Maybe that’s the problem, that Odette’s is so well nestled within its neighbourhood that it deserves to remain a secret and not be paraded around the internet like yet another ice chips and beetroot trend that becomes dangerously out of fashion the moment it comes into vogue. Conceptual nonsense has no place in Odette’s ; This restaurant mainly involves a hardworking and a fairly young chef – coming into his prime – who passionately slaves away in his kitchen (most days and nights, if not every) to craft one of the most delicious Anglo-Franco menus in London. His six course taster is ‘merely’ £50, reasonable considering the category of restaurants, Odette’s is in competition with. It is also open everyday.

Since the last time I was here 15 months ago, it seems the restaurant had undergone a small facelift. Gone are the flowery green wallpapers, and soon to go, I’m told, are the brass chandeliers. Regardless, the space is still terribly romantic, given that this part of Primrose Hill is quite scenic itself (local residents own gorgeously groomed pets) ; It is my opinion that these kind of restaurants are becoming a rarity. Odette’s has character, authenticity and a hardworking chef/owner – just the right blend of factors to produce romantic secret suppers.

A couple of sundays ago, I attended the last of Bryn’s sunday supperclub dinners in 2011, a four course meal that sought to combine beer and truffle. This wasn’t an exclusive bloggero one-night-only special pop-up which punters can never get to. The supper club didn’t happen at an unlicensed location, nor did it take place at The Loft, instead, it took place in a bit of a private dining space toward the back of the restaurant. I took Mark and we sat with about 10 or so patrons who were a mixture of Bryn fans such as myself, and a table of chefs, whom we assumed were Bryn’s pals in the business.

The restaurant newsletter here mentions what they lay on every so few months. These supper clubs are like seasonal one-off three coursers which he lays on over the course of a Sunday evening once per quarter, ranging from £50 to this one at £85. I also think it is a pilot program of sorts for him to test new recipes. Our test group were subjected to an unorthodox pairing of beer and truffle, two items in hospitality which rarely find their way on the same table at the same time.

After a glass of bubbly, the chef himself came out to greet his supperclubbers and gave a short monologue about the evening’s theme, his inspiration behind the dinner and to shed some light on the genesis of the meal. It’s always illuminating having the chef speak about his ideas, I was obviously in chef heaven, he came across as he does on TV, someone incredibly down to earth and genuine, but also you could sense his passion for cooking in the way he talks about food. Besides, it’s always a rush to have the main man come out from behind broilers to shake hands and receive backslaps from patrons. Shortly after the presentation, Bryn headed back into the engine room and not long after, the first course came flooding out.

Salt Cod Brandade, Green Beans & Truffle.
with Kirin Ichiban, Japan.

I don’t think I’ve ever tried the ‘Premium Press’ version of Kirin before. Anyway, here’s a reference to The Beer Journey‘s description of the Japanese biru – fizzy, pure and delicately sweet, easy drinking stuff that was redolent of biru brewed with koshi-hikari (only the best rice for sushi). Generous shavings of summer truffle (I think) covering a fluffy rendition of brandade with appetising flavours of salt and cod. A spoonful of cod and potatoes, a swirl of kirin – from a glass – and a sniff of truffle : Well won’t you believe it – they sure work well together. If flavours worked like ice cream cake, then the truffle would be analogous to a layer of clotted cream ice cream layered atop a chiffon of beer.

Roast rump of Welsh beef, pomme Ana & truffle
with Quilmes, Argentina.

A stronger beer to tackle a more muscular set of ingredients. The rump was beautifully pink, a little chewy as is expected for rump, but slow-cooked enough to mellow out the textures to a tender chew. Robust beefy flavours as expected of Welsh (black I think) beef, but the real highlight were the crisp crusted buttery layers of sliced potatoes. Truffle and potato on the same plate make for a very classic case of umaminess. I was glad it was not overdone with too much of either ingredients. I know this because, I sat through a truffle meal at Terres de Truffes in Paris, in which the main course was a boiled potato, a creamy truffle sauce and overly-generous shavings of truffle, which was flavour overkill. This on the other hand, was a flavour-rush.

Anyway, a classic effort, one that was beautifully executed and had managed to brilliantly balance out those big flavours. Besides, how can anyone not like truffle, beef and beer right?

Whipped goats cheese, truffle honey
with Cusquena, Peru.

Whipped with cream, and honey from nearby Regent’s Park, soaked in perigord. A copper saucepan contained more of the truffle infused honey, in case we couldn’t get enough of the good stuff. Mmmm. The beauty of any meal with truffle is obviously the smell, especially with a hot, steaming dish. To me, truffle is that initial whiff of rooty fragrance, after that, the brain seems to acclimatise to the strong smell and it never gets better than that very first hit of flavour when the dish comes to the table. I gobbled up the cheese and licked the saucepan dry.

Carpaccio of pineapple, truffle
with Leffe Blonde, Belgium.

Sliced pineapple soaked in truffle syrup, served with pineapple sorbet. Like the goats cheese, the truffle infusion was more of a complimentary accent, rather than a full on concentrated experience. The result was a unique savoury edge to the sugary pineapple syrup. This tethered on the edge of sensible flavours – a little bit like eating brie with chocolate.

After the meal we chatted briefly to Bryn, I told him how much I admired his work, stopping short of asking him to sign my manboobs. He told us of his plans to strip down the tensions associated with classy meals, in effect to make his restaurant less intimidating and a more comfortable place to eat. I suppose he was trying to articulate that he wanted to make it even more neighbourly and create an even friendly atmosphere than it already possesses. We also asked him about expectations for a Michelin star, and he told us that while it would be a nice to have, he really is more interested in satisfying return customers than chasing accolades. Mark and I did both agree that he deserves one and the only reason he probably hasn’t been granted one, is his sole proprietorship. His cooking is already way up there. This kind of food isn’t the deeply philosophical, it’s just delicious.

I will reinterate what I said last year that and I believe that Bryn Williams is currently one of the most exciting young chefs today. More importantly, he is building the very foundations of a landmark restaurant. Remember the days when the Ledbury was a one-star off-shoot backed by Phil Howard and fronted by a young gun ? That was only three years ago, and look where Brett is today. I believe Bryn is travelling along the same trajectory, and I suspect we’ll hear much more of Odette’s in the years to come. And if you don’t write about him, then at the very least, I will continue to champion Bryn Williams.

The Gist of It

Odette’s
British, £60pp
130 Regent’s Park Road NW1 8XL
Tel: 020 7586 5486
Tube: Chalk Farm

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

Banana skin. I was suggested to try the ‘Ocre Rouge’, a Pinot Noir from Dions (as opposed to Burgundy) and I had come to the conclusion that this was a quirky little devil of a wine. The finish and its tannin structure was akin to banana skin, a first and a rather interesting peculiarity. The same could be said of the terribly cramped environs of the new Soho opening which has captivated Twitter’s appetite. Not only are they the latest restaurant to operate a no reservation service, they have gone the extra mile to install a record player on premises, inviting returning patrons to share their vinyl collection with everybody in the room. Ducksoup is either a genuinely hip place to dine or at the very least a good pretender. It is in keeping with the presumption that Londoners are still very much in love with the idea of less is more when eating out. Think Brawn, Spuntino and Rochelle Canteen throw in a Kitchenaid, then splashed across Fernandez & Wells. Et voilà.

The brains behind this genius are ex-Hix, chef Julian Biggs ( I think he is the beardy one) , Clare Lattin and Rory McCoy, collectively have managed to make the genre of uber-cool and understated, easily egalitarian yet decidedly British restaurant, feel refreshed once again. I really like the name, obviously it is not named after soup, but it gives the entirely random but accidentally on purpose impression, yes? (Yes Kang, keep up the bullshit). Might it have been a homage to a Marx Brothers film, I wonder.

Like many of today’s savvy restauranteurs, the key to conquering market share is online presence. Ducksoup are well equipped of course, already making all the right connections on twitter, (very usefully) posting their daily changing menu on their tumblr. That saves me the trouble of having to snap a photo of their menu. People are tweeting about them, forums are intrigued by the idea of this restaurant, half the battle with restaurants – in my opinion – is appealing to the masses. Once you get it in the prospective diners’ mind that your restaurant is ‘the place to be’ , you are half way there to enticing free wheelin’ hungry gluttons to your restaurant. Whoever Ducksoup have paid to brand their restaurant, I think they have done a bang up job with the subtle campaign.

So lets rewind to my first visit, a late 3pm lunch (high tea?) on the 14th October 2011, to some of you, it may be significant, because that’s also the day we queued up for the iPhone 4S. Yes, heckle as you do, what can I say? I’m a victim of the times, I queued up and paid my dues to the Cupertino empire, and then promptly trotted off to Soho for a late lunch to fondle my new gizmo. Since then, I’ve discovered what anaddictive app Instagram is. Take it from me that the camera on the new iPhone is so good, it alone is worth forking out £500 to replace any ageing point and shoots.

Tomato bread, olive oil, £3.50.

Snap. snap. I was expecting baked foccacia with bits of dried tomato, but instead, this was more like a stew, or perhaps a panzanella made with fresh instead of stale bread. The keyword here is fresh : This bread salad was really wholesome, juicy stuff. I don’t know what tomatoes they used, but I could tell you now, that they were plump.

Lamb cutlets, lemon, salt, £14.00.

Bony. Really bony, is this all the food £14 buys these days? I could pardon the low value for money because these were some of the best lamb cutlets I’d had in a long time. Again, I don’t know where the sheep were from, but they were fragrant, juicy, interestingly a little gamebird like, well seasoned and well fried.

Creme Caramel, £5.00.

What? A fiver for baked milk and eggs? Somebody’s having a laugh. Overpriced and not that well made, could do with more caramel sauce.

My first visit was intriguing enough, that I felt compelled to go back to try it again. I enjoyed the cosy atmosphere well enough, and whoever served me that day, she made me fall dangerously in love… with the restaurant. After meal one, it was pretty obvious this place was not another Russell Norman copycat, because it was rather expensive. I paid £35 for three plates of food plus a glass of white wine. I did admire the sheer quality of produce, while cooking was minimal, I felt it was the work of deft hands.

And so, I went back a week later. As you can peer into the ktichen, and if I am not mistaken, I believe I spotted an (ex?) Zucca chef in there. Can someone confirm? A she.

Chopped raw bavette, toasts, £7.

Fucking great tartare. The meat was beaten to a mince, which meant slithery, soft and smooth going down. Again, I thought ‘wow what great produce’ managing to taste visceral and lively, who knew a bashed bavette could be so tender? Most of all however, it was expertly well seasoned, I’m supposing garlic, salt, onion and capers (and obvious the egg yolk) , that if they were to turn it into a burger, it would turn out to be a pretty sterling patty. Fancy that. Bavette Burger, with Brioche and Ovinsardo. And ducksoup chips. They could sell that for £14.

Fritto Misto, £14.

A langoustine, artichokes, sliced orange, seabass and two slices of scallop, all fried. At first I thought “bloody hell is this it?” (Yes, I talk to myself a lot). The equivalent makele samak at Yalla Yalla gets you a mountain of seafood at half the price, but then I cut into the seabass and all memories of shitty seafood fried to a crisp were banished. The fish…amazing. The langoustine …fresh , but it were the queenies which took my breath away. I cut them down the middle and found a reassuring translucent centre, clap, clap, I applaud a kitchen that understands the importance of never overcooking. The scallops were some of the juiciest mollusks I’d ever had. My mum would have loved it. In fact, the restaurant had so much confidence in its produce that the other mains were simply raw queenies and raw langoustines.

And so we are back to the Pinot from Dions. I was certain of it now, it was definitely the taste of banana skin. This time round I avoided the pudding, but still forked out £30 for the meal. I did not have the Fucking Hell during either visit.

I am overwhelmed by the quality of produce, the seasonal menu may not read well, but I think it is a mark of sure-footed focus and even in its beginning days, Ducksoup is already a rather refined product. Because the space is really just a bar attached to an overachieving kitchen, the ambiance can become quite a bit chaotic. For instance, I was solo dining at the far edge of the bar which was also used by staff to consolidate orders and take card payments, I couldn’t hang my coat, so it stayed on my lap through the meal and at times, it felt like eating on a moving bus. Then again, if you are willing to eat standing up at Jose, this will not be an issue. I think we may be witnessing the derivation of a certain genre of restaurant. What shall we call it ? The soho diner perhaps. It feels cool, it is obvious that people come because it makes them feel exactly that. It’s not a bad thing of course, there is nothing wrong with feeling cool when eating out. In some ways, it reminds me of when Polpo first opened.

So my verdict is that Ducksoup is a solid 3.5 titanium stars out of 5. I think cooking is precise and disciplined but honestly, the recipes are banal, so don’t come here expecting fancy antics. Ducksoup is a no bullshit establishment. I’d like to think it is serving food that its chefs would cook for themselves at the end of service, which is the source of its appeal. The produce is of exceptional quality, if they can keep up the standard of sourcing, I think they will win many fans.

But I feel that they could have eased off the pricing during year one. £5 for small plates and £12 for large ones would have made more sense. Perhaps the ingredients are already quite dear, I don’t know, but I can’t keep up £30 two plate lunches when I know I would only spend a third less at a Russell Norman. I recommend avoiding the creme caramel until they pump more effort into something that is actually worth five pounds.

So, Soho is becoming a great place to eat isn’t it? There are now so many unique options for nourishment nestled amongst our beloved tourist traps. Superb noodles? Koya. A slice of America? Spuntino. How about some trendy beans from down under? Flat White. Tart up for some vintage fayne dining ? Gauthier. Simple everyman burger? Darth Byron. The best roastduck in Europe? Four Seasons (debatable of course). And introducing fried oranges and your personal LPs : Ducksoup.

The Deets.

Ducksoup
Egalitarian. Italian, I suppose. £35pp.
41 Dean Street W1D 4PY
Tel: 0207 287 4599
Tube: Piccadilly Circus

Stir the soup: TimeOut , A lot on her plate , Richard Godwin , The Skinny Bib

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

Perhaps this is the secret to the good cooking since this is also the view from Stephen Harris’ kitchen. I’m sure you must have heard about this place by now, quite literally every blog and hack with the vaguest interest in food, in this country has written and raved about this michelin starred restaurant. It is one amongst a very rare collection of restaurants which commands near unanimous appeal, and as such, it is often regarded as the very best this country has to offer.

The original gastropub began life when Stephen sat through a revelatory meal at Chez Nico way back in ’92, which then became his inspiration to bring the slickness of high cooking to a more accessible setting. In the subsequent years, Stephen set about unravelling the mysteries of macaroon winning ways by visiting the nation’s darling restauranteurs of the era including MPW and GR until one fine November day in 1999, he decided to buy an isolated pub nestled between the English coast on one side and rolling fields of grazing sheep on the other. He crafted a brand new kind of experience that sought to marry cutting edge decadence with a wedge of the English seaside. Boy, did he managed that and then some. Today, he holds a Michelin star, the restaurant is constantly full up, and it must be said that the local taxi operators owe a large chunk of their business to Stephen.

Venturing out of town exclusively to experience a mind blowing meal is very appealing to me these days. The anticipation and the physical act of travelling to an alien location. You feel your mind mature on the train (as you lock eyes with grazing sheep) and contemplate how life may change after the adventure. The Sportsman is located in Seasalter along the North coast of Kent, between Faversham and Whitstable. To get there, one must brave a 90 minute journey from Victoria (assuming you are travelling from London) , 70 of which on a train to Faversham, and the remainder is spent hurling on the narrow and winding roads toward the coast. The experience is pilgramatic (not a real word) altogether, when we finally reached the destination, I couldn’t help but admire how peaceful this part of the world was. The air was fresh, time moved at a more profound pace, the winds whispered sweet nothings as they brushed past my hair, how nourishing for the soul… is this what heaven looks like for us gluttons?

Decor is as unassuming as any loved-up family owned pub in the country. The all-wooden interior does feels a little shabby, musky but very down to earth leading me to speculate that this is all probably intentional. It was reminiscent of walking into a warmly welcoming B&B, the ambiance has more in common with a home than a portentous purveyor of gastronomy. Everything seems so blissful, I felt like I was on holiday. Total zen.

Taster menus were not available on weekends, so instead we were instructed to pick our 3 courses from the chalked up daily menu by the bar. I washed down with a pint of late red ale as I resisted the temptation of ordering everything on the menu. After we settled on our table, I headed to the restrooms to wash my hands, and contemplated putting a two pound coin into the condom machine, to take home a souvenir from this visit.

Home-made bread on the house.

“All baked in-house.” The restaurant’s pride in their food is immediately made known to us. It is widely understood that Harris places a lot of emphasis on his produce, leaving as little to 3rd parties as is possible, which (so I read) include churning their own butter and growing much of their own vegetables. Sourcing locally is in vogue these days, after all the ability to secure fresh ingredients of consistent quality is half the battle toward perfecting the art of sustenance. The soda bread, foccacia and sourdough were perfect.

The Starters

Crab risotto, £9.95.

I think the risotto was made with brown crab meat, and so came infused with a mud-like minerality. My attention was immediately arrested by the essence of shellfish within the risotto. The flavours were in perfect balance. The fishy brown crab allowed to clash with the brightness of the white crab meat in the ultimate battle for your tastebuds’ affections.

Many have praised how brilliantly simple the food is at The Sportsman, and based on this meal, I have to agree. It is brilliant. I’d add to that hyperbole and say that it isn’t just mere simplicity that has intrigued, rather I think they have achieved some higher form of elegance. I think it is mainly to do with the balancing of flavours – eerily harmonious. The dish was entirely easy to eat, there was such clarity in the execution, that one feels will appeal to any set of tastebuds, imparting a sense of total nourishment, and I believe that’s the beauty – you don’t need to acquire any tastes to eat here, it is simply just good grub.

Pork Terrine, £9.95.

Same story here, like the missus’ risotto, this cold terrine was another lesson that highlighted the importance of balanced flavours. I appreciated that it was not overly salty, and was made with dense chunks of pork. The cabbage wrapping was the stand out feature – imparting a crisp brightness to the flavours. Cabbage-infused pork, it was brilliant because it was such an easy dish to eat. Needless to say, the scratchings on the side were fine as well.

Mains

Roast Waterham farm chicken with bread sauce and roasting juices, £17.95.

Damn fine roast chicken in every respect. I can’t seem to remember a better version of chicken at a restaurant, maybe when I visited Harnett’s Y&A , but as chicken goes, this has become a cherished memory for me. Tender, smooth and soft textures, the bread sauce was lightly spiced, and the roasting juices enveloped the chicken with a wonderful vanilla-like fragrance. Perfumed chicken, I must also applaud the sheer quality of produce – great ingredients carefully cooked by someone who loves to eat. Most of all however, I thought the potatoes were ace. Like mashed potato croquettes as opposed to just potatoes cooked in fat.

Thornback ray, brown butter, cockles and sherry vinegar dressing, £19.95.

A sweet vinegar, feminine lemon butter flavours, smelling all lavender and tulips, the garden of flavours were as nourishing as the surroundings we were in. The fish was fresh, and so the textures were lively, the cockles were chock full of sand, and so were a little rough upon chewing. A nice fish dish, visually stunning, but if I am honest, just a shy overcooked and probably a tad under seasoned, but still it was a satisfying main dish.

Custard tart with plum ripple ice cream, £6.95.

I loved the pudding. This is better than the Marcus Wareing recipe. The textures were so cloud-like, more akin to a whippy mousse, or perhaps meringue from a baked alaska than humble baked custard – how did they manage this kind of texture? Easily the most unique custard tart I’ve yet had – the lightness was pure genius.

This is what you see when you leave The Sportsman.

Salt and fish recovered from the sea, lamb and poultry from within driving distance and vegetables grown in their back garden – This is our Noma, why travel to Copenhagen when we already have such a gem in our backyard? Amazingly, for 5 dishes of food, two coffees and two drinks, lunch was an extremely appealing £72.35. What fantastic value for money.

All in all, I think The Sportsman thoroughly deserves its reputation, this kitchen is a finely tuned instrument, Harris and his team can definitely make sweet music with pots and pans, the sheer clarity in the cooking is rarely experienced, and something that eager gluttons yearn for. But upon reflection on the ride back to London, I don’t think this meal was the revelation I’d hope it would be. It came very close to changing my life, but truthfully it didn’t. In a way, I don’t think it’s meant to, this isn’t the precise opera of Blumenthal, this is the jazz of Harris in a seriously laid back pub. I think that while the honesty and authenticity in the cooking is admirable, it is the pure romance in its setting that makes The Sportsman truly special. I can see myself coming out here again, The Sportsman is a charming restaurant and a class act. Together with Kerridge’s Hand & Flowers in Marlow, I believe they epitomise the concept of haute cuisine without table cloths. Not absolutely extravagant, but still more than worthy of a visit, if only to lock eyes with the sheep.

The Deets.

The Sportsman
British. £55pp.
Faversham Road, Kent CT5 4BP
Tel: 01227 273370
Travel: Train from Victoria to Faversham, then 15min taxi ride.

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

There was a time in the last decade, where the concept of redressing Modern Brit cuisine around the starkly model which Fergus Henderson created, championed and subsequently turned into a culinary dynasty, was unique to the Hendersons. And those who cooked with Henderson. Eventually, these frontrunners adopted what is widely accepted as the St John way. Back in late 2007 (back when foodbloggers were a rarity, and the iPhone was 2G only… remember those days?), a little known restaurant named after the street it took residence, opened to rather pleasing reviews by the nation’s doyens of critics. The simplistic, slick and focused cooking was more than redolent of the Hand of Henderson, and it was only natural to expect it; afterall Chef Pemberton was previously the head chef at Bread & Wine.

In the four years or so since it opened, Hereford Road had grown to adopt the reputation of a dependable neighbourhood restaurant. It was always on my list, but which has eluded me for all of my blogging career, because well, I suppose I was probably preoccupied with discovering the original Henderson owned eateries (I say eateries, since my heart still yearns for Rochelle Canteen). Ironic, considering Hereford Road is actually in my neighbourhood.

But this isn’t just another gastropub of course, this is as much a restaurant, as St John is a restaurant. An off-shoot, spawned from the original purveyor of British cuisine.

Unlike Henderson’ shrine, Hereford Road’s menu is less challenging, more mellow and seems to cling to lowering profile, as opposed to an all guns blazing approach, but it is not without ammunition. Aside from the deep fried calf’s brain (a constant feature in the changing daily menu) , the rest of the menu won’t have you taking a deep breath before negotiating muscular flavours.

Braised cuttlefish and red wine, £6.80.

The better half started with some cool and saucy cuttlefish. A light seafood salad, a little boring, but flavoured correctly kicked off the evening in an appreciable manner.

Crispy Pork, Dandelion, mustard, £5.80.

Yours truly opted to tackle some gut bustingly crispy belly pork, very juicy meat and cracking skin. A greasy salad, pickled and garnished with capers, which I thought helped to make it a rather vibrant start to my own evening. We liked both starters and we appreciated the simplicity.

Sea trout, cucumber, chervil, samphire, £14.

When done right, there is little to complain about this combination of ingredients. A crisply fried piece of fish, fresh samphire and a squidge of 100% lemon juice – what more could you ask of your local neighbourhood restaurant? I felt this dish best epitomised the essence of Hereford Road, there is no pomp here, just honest cooking.

Roast veal, courgettes, saffron, £15.

I loved this. The flavour of saffron, something so difficult to describe, fragrant, perfumery, mettalic, coming in contact with the mushy, delicate flavour of courgettes was exhilarating. I have always admired dishes with saffron in it, such a mercurial spice both visually and in terms of flavour. Even the faintest addition of it shows up, because its red colour is so damn vibrant, but it is the unmistakable smell of it, that really transforms the dish into something just a tad more elegant.

Veering off-topic, I recently had vanilla gelato scented with strands of saffron at Gelupo that was simply the best vanilla ice cream flavour, man has ever created. In my opinion of course.

And swerving back on topic, the natural floral fragrance of veal, married with the fluttery bouquet of saffron, was one made in the clouds. Roasty, steamy, tender so earthy and honest, complete with an intense yet simple drizzle of gravy, made this one of the best experiences of roast veal, I’ve ever had. The only thing missing was perhaps some triple cooked chips. Fabulously elegant stuff.

Loganberry sherry trifle, £5.50

Puddings were old school, the trifle was drunk with alcohol and rich with egg, custard, cream, sugar and jam, all cramped into a small glass, producing sinful mouthful after mouthful of pure sweetness.

Buttermilk pudding, £5.50

This on the other hand, was a little too zesty for me and not wobbly enough. I wished we had ordered two trifles instead.

We paid £63.55 including a glass of Margot and a latte.

A quintessential neighbourhood restaurant, whilst it may be overshadowed by shinier and newer concepts such as Brawn or Spuntino or Harwood Arms, but I won’t knock it because it is nevertheless a great place to grab some grub. There isn’t anything magical about the cooking, I feel it is very honest, very neighbourly, inviting, laid back, friendly and in many respects, this is what you want your neighbourhood restaurant to be : safe, secure, a place to recharge and to savour every last bite in peace.

The Gist of It

Hereford Road
British, £35pp
3 Hereford Road W2 4AB
Tel : 020 7727 1144
Tube: Bayswater

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you cansubscribe to the RSS feed.

£46 may sound like a steep price, but I assure you, it is one of the best investments you will make, when you are looking for something to fill that gaping void when you are feeling utterly ravenous. The proposition in question is the £46 buffet at the 4th floor restaurant inside the guts of Harrods. Yes, it’s that sprawling space past the pet section, with the autopiano running off epic Chinese ballads, and the occasional Whitney Houston belter.

The all-you-can-eat includes unlimited return trips of roast rib of beef, leg of lamb or turkey, and occasionally fish (though I didn’t see any) , plus all the trimmings you can afford to pile on to your plate without the mountain of food collapsing before you get back to your table. Not to mention the myriad of salads, cold cured meats, cold seafood, cheese and fruit.

This is what I managed on the first trip:

Roast lamb, and roast beef and yorkshire puds, gravy and carrots … all on the same plate. Mmmm. But where we got our pennies worth were these superb king prawns…

…. some of the juiciest giant shellfish ever to grace a free for all buffet. Seriously, these things could easily pass for £3 a pop at a Caprice outfit or a Hart brothers restaurant. The missus and I kept going back for more and more of these until we got sick of deshelling and degutting prawns. Sweet and juicy. Yeah. The prawns alone were more than worth the entrance fee.

You know I’ve got a sweet tooth right?

The green blob on the right, is I believe is matcha flavoured Turkish delight. It was ridiculously good, so too was the bread pudding, and the rest of the icing and soft meringue topped sugary creations from the Harrods kitchens.

We paid about £100 for the buffet and a couple of glasses of wine, and I quite enjoyed the old school touristy thing to do in our city. Speaking of atmosphere, it was a nice getaway from reality, the banquet-like ambiance, the carvery and tall chef hats, the trolleys – I’ve always tended to think of Sunday lunch as the British version of dim sum. I wouldn’t necessarily call it the ‘epitome of elegant dining’ as the Harrods website indicates, maybe if we were all characters in an episode of Dallas goes to England. The food is as good looking as what’s in the ground floor food hall, the produce is fresh and the result is quite a high quality all you can eat buffet. Not the finest moment in gastronomy, but you shouldn’t expect to put your food snob hat on for this sort of thing, like the all you can eat meat feast at a Rodizio Rico, it’s all about value for money.

To sum up, I’d like to use a (probably the best) quote from Rocky Balbao :

“…It ain’t about how hard ya hit, it’s about how hard you can get it and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done. Now if you know what you’re worth then go out and get what you’re worth.”

Now go forth and get your money’s worth, champ.

The Deets.

All you can eat, £46.
The Georgian Restaurant
4th Floor Harrods
87–135 Brompton Road
SW1X 7XL

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

I’ve not been this excited about a neighbourhood restaurant for a long time coming and I could only thing of one place to visit for my birthday, last weekend. This time, I took with me, a couple of serial restaurant goers in Mark and Carina, who are such, out of necessity because of work, and obviously because they enjoy the lifestyle, and my better and more skeptical half. 12 courses (that’s 3 x 4 palates) later and we were all largely in agreement : Medlar is brilliant.

I am a firm believer that great dishes rely upon the individual aspects being cooked correctly. The basics have got to be right, since each element acts like a building block, so that when it’s all assembled, it has the best chance of becoming more than the sum of its parts.

Everywhere we sniffed and licked, we were greeted with slick cooking. Take the most basic dish we were served for example, the triple cooked chips, and the in-house whipped béarnaise. Dipping the crusty chips into the scintillating béarnaise was life threateningly addictive. This is a kitchen that respect the art of the simple side dish and by extension, is also kitchen that’s understands the true meaning of good food.

They were some of the best chips I’ve ever had. Better than the overhyped stuff at Hawksmoor or even at Dinner (and Hind’s Head) , perhaps in part because one would not expect triple cooked chips to be this good in such a restaurant.

That was only the start of the good news. The crab ravioli was pasta barely containing a burst of shellfish, the sea, salt and sand; the honeycomb ice cream with the chocolate torte was just plain sinful. Generally speaking, food was rich and large portioned, Brit with a French accent, contemporary yet rooted in tradition. For £25, three courses lasted until supper, and the feeling of being utterly well-fed was satisfying. Afterall, that’s what you want to take away from any meal.

In the end, my very generous diners helped me pay for my birthday meal, £164.75 plus coffee and a carafe of Syrah.

If you’re still hanging on to the last sentence to describe how overly emotive the last meal made you feel, forget it. Drop your keyboard, stop looking on twitter, pick up the phone and jump on the 328 to Worlds End. I will maintain what I wrote in the last review, that this restaurant deserves an award, it should be on a shortlist, or perhaps even a Michelin star, and if nobody will hand it a gong, then at the very least, for me, (assuming no new amazing restaurants open from now till year end) Medlar is my pick for the best new restaurant of 2011.

Now go forth and spread the hype.

Starters

Thinly sliced rump of veal withrocket, fondant potatoes, parmesan, aioli and roasting juices.

Crab raviolo with samphire, brown shrimp, fondue of leeks and bisque sauce.

Mains.

Under blade fillet with persillade snails, salad, triple cooked chips and béarnaise.

Gnocchi with swiss chard, taleggio, girolles and confit cherry tomatoes.

Lamb rack and confit shoulder with balsamic peppers, sweetbreads and niçoise jus.

Assiette of rabbit with pomme anna, carrot pureé, red onion marmalade and lovage

Dessert.

Chocolate and almond torte with honeycomb ice cream and caramel sauce.

Cherry and frangipane croustade with griottines and milk ice cream.

Buttermilk pannacotta with English strawberries, pistachios and financier.

Macaroon with English raspberries, birthday candle.

The Deets.

Medlar Restaurant
British £25 for lunch at £38 for dinner.
438 Kings Road SW10 0LJ
Tel : 020 7349 1900
Tube : Sloane Square

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.

I discovered a fact about you lot (which seems intuitive but something you never really think about) when I first sat down for this meal at Roganic, and that is nobody eats lunch at 12 pm on Saturdays. In fact, you don’t show up till about 1.30. Talk about being unfashionably early. I booked myself in for the high noon sitting, but was actually a quarter of an hour early anyway. I skipped breakfast you see, because Roganic is one of those restaurant premised upon a idyllic gastronomic journey as opposed to a bog standard meat and two veg. So for half of the meal, I had the entire front of house to myself, it felt the complete opposite of being lonely (as I was dining solo), the staff gave their sole (and first) patron (of the day) their undivided attention.

Anyway, you should care about the opening of Roganic, because Roganic’s chef patron is none other than Simon Rogan. Michelin star holder and co-owner of the unashamedly high concept L’Enclume in the Lake District. The restaurant named after Rogan and which is also a play on ‘organic’ is to my best guessimations, a reflection of Rogan’s philosophy to grow and cook (most of) his own produce, alluding to a certain level of unrivalled excellence in the ingredients.

Rogan himself does not run this kitchen, that honour belongs to one young Mr Ben Spalding. I was fortunate enough (and rather humbled) to meet the man after the meal, because this guy’s track record is pretty fantastic. His stints include 28+ in Gothenburg, Per Se in NYC, His Majesty, GR at Royal Hospital Road, L’Autre Pied, Gary Rhodes W1 at the Cumberland, Vue de monde in Melbourne, The Fat Duck, Le Manoir, The Capital (during its 2* days) and Bagatelle in Oslo. That’s a lot of michelin stars, quite safe to say that Ben brings with him a wealth of experience.

The restaurant is tiny, and for a posh outfit, the decor certainly carries a lightweight ambiance. Fittings are at their bare mininum, just enough tarting up to make it decent, afterall this project is initially a two year pop-up (till the lease finishes) , but with a view to turn it into a permanent outfit, once they find somewhere bigger, and I’d imagine if the business is well-liked by people like you and I.

There are three menu choices which vary depending on how much time you have for the meal. £29 for three courses, £69 for six and £80 for ten. Naturally, I opted for the ten, for the benefit of you guys who like staring at food photos.

Ten courses to follow, quite exhaustive, so here we go…

Teaser.

A chicken and cheese wafer to kick proceedings off…

Bread. Pumpernickel, splet, potato and buttermlik

… before the perpetually replenishment bread selection served with butter seasoned with maldon sea salt. The bread were ridiculously addictive, warm, soft and I’d imagine baked daily in house, I kept trying to fight the temptation not to eat them, but I probably ended up eating 12 of these with each of the dishes.

Course One : Broad bean and hyssop, fresh curds and beetroot

This felt like it might have been a soup, but had set like gelatin in the fridge, to give rise to a kind of smooth texture, like walking on sand or laying down on a memory foam pillow. Rooty, refreshing and harmonious. Zen.

Course Two : Rubin turnip baked in salt, smoked yolk, sea vegetables and wild mustard

I really liked this. Clear flavours, simple execution, and rather beautiful to look at. Sharp turnips and a genuine smoky flavoured yolk, with a cake-like texture.

Course Three : Seawater cured Kentish mackerel, orache, broccoli and warm elderflower honey

The seawater is apparently collected from The English Channel, the honey from nearby Regent’s Park. I think this is the first time I’ve come across honey, broccoli and fish on the same plate. Firstly, the fish had great texture, flakiness that defies the laws of physics, well salted, a rich flavour, yet it wasn’t too heavy. The moussed broccoli and honey was revelatory to say the least, calming, comforting and impeccably well balanced in flavour. I feel like this recipe has been tweaked and tweaked and then some to reach a level of refinement, that resembles what perfection might tasted like. Exciting stuff.

Course Four : Shredded ox tongue, pickles and sourdough paper

The shredded ox tongue was a little like a terrine, it’s meant to be rendered in duck fat, but I found it to be rather bland overall. It was like an intermission.

Course Five : Flaky Crab and mallow cream, young squid and cucumber

Nothing flaky about this. Flavours of sea and sand in this dish. The crab I assume is hand picked tasted very lively. Cubes of cucumber and silken textured raw squid added to the crispy freshness of the dish. I liked the salty squid ink-ed croutons. Overall, a very pretty dish, clean flavours of the sea, simple, elegant.

Course Six : Vintage potatoes in onion ashes, lovage and wood sorrel

My waiter tried to explain the provenance of these vintage potatoes to me, a dish which is originally on the L’Enclume menu, but I must say, I’ve forgotten most of what he said. What I can tell you is that the potatoes were ridiculously well textured, like powdered wax, and smooth mash, but obviously unmashed, and just the richest flavour of potato I’ve ever had. There was sweetness and sharp saltiness in the onion ash that added to the fluffy potato. Who knew potato could be eaten as the main as opposed to the side and reach such dizzy heights of pleasure.

Let me also applaud the beautiful plating up. You can tell that the chefs have pumped their fullest energy into building each and every dish into a work of instant art.

Course Seven : Roasted brill, chicken salt, cockles and ruby chard

I like how each dish is simple. Simple in the sense that each recipe has a clear and present focus on what it wants the diner to experience. For example, with the vintage potatoes, the dish says ‘great potatoes’ , with the smoked yolk it says ‘quirky and delish egg yolk’ . With this one, it’s all about the marvellously rich flavour of chicken. It tasted like the stock of chicken, and also chicken fat, like the kind of bubbly richness you experience from freshly fried chicken. Also a little like Chinese oyster sauce. The brill was naturally cooked to perfect flakiness (like the mackerel) , and I thought the addition of cockles was a stroke of genius to tart up the entire affair. It’s another seriously beautiful plate of food.

Course Eight : Cumbrian hogget, sweetbreads artichokes and chenopodiums

I thought the hogget was pure magic. Hogget (maa..) which is sheep slaughtered between one and two, and half way from lamb (less than a year, baa.. ) to mutton (old sheep, burp). Great texture, tenderness to the nth level, not the best sweetbreads recipe I’ve had, but pretty damn good. The melding of the tender hogget and mousse-like sweetbreads was unique. Nutty flavours.

Course Nine : Sweet ciceley with strawberry, buttermilk and verbena

Both puddings were absolutely fantastic. I loved this ciceley ice cream, herbal, minty and almost ginger like. The strawberry shards were candied genius, it was redolent of strawberry lozenges. Apt for the weather, and the pannacotta like custard was perfect. Another awesomely well-textured experience.

Course Ten : Warm spiced bread, salted almonds, buckthorn curd, smoked clotted cream

Smoked cream is a first for me, it was like having meat flavour ice cream… ok, not meat flavoured, but smoke-flavoured, kind of salty, I don’t actually, now that I think about it, I find it hard to put it in words. It was certainly unique. However, the real winner on this plate was the light and crusty spiced bread. Sugar, spice and crunch, a stylish end to a stylish meal.

(Epilogue?) Douglas Fir Milkshake and Flapjack.

As I sipped the herb infused milkshake and chewed on the flapjack, I tried to sum up the meal in my mind, it wasn’t easy, partly because it was so long, and because it was so long, I’d imagine not many of you might actually care to read every single detail of each dish. And my gosh, was there attention to detail in this meal. The kitchen goes out of its way to make sure that the diner is made aware of the significance of what is served, each dish is focused on something particular, and it’s obvious that a lot of care has gone into ensuring each dish is on spec when it gets plated up. This thorough examination feels like the antithesis of the traditional idea of upper level dining; where one usually expects a complex marriage of ingredients on the same plate, here the grand ideas are compartmentalised, and allowed to stretch out over ten dishes. If you stack the experience of each dish one on top of the other, like layers of design for say a silicon microprocessor, then you see that the weaving of the big picture is quite breathtaking.

I admire the fact that the entire meal feels focused, the recipes all seem to work in unison toward achieving some singular goal. In that regard, I also admired the surgically precise cooking, and isolation of key flavours, it was so disciplined, and I must stress the obsessive attention to detail, is both startling and admirable. I really must commend the chefs working on that day, and I have to commend them for being able to churn out the same high level of quality night in night out.

Different people have a different reaction and opinion on what is wow. Some crave the complexity, some like the ceremony. Others adore the pomposity, while for some, it’s life and style. And there are those who march to the beat of the contemporary trend because the blogs say so, and while some think dining out is to reconnect with your first times. Your first memory of capers. Your first pizza. Your first steak sandwich with Heinz. Your first French Toast. Your first coffee.

I think there’s a lot of firsts with this meal at Roganic, the elemental discovery was like being in primary school, the gastronomic education as revelatory as it was clear to understand. A host of alternative cooking to heat is involved, such as smoking, mousing, curing brining, dehydrating (some which I made up obviously) , lots of herbs, and finally, a visual delight.

If you are into this sort of discover your palate experience, I thought Roganic is pretty good. In fact, it might be better than Pollen Street Social.

In the end, even the cupcakes had pop rocks in them for abit of fun. Not cheap by any stretch of the imagination, I paid £98.44 for the ten courses and a glass for wine, and hopefully I’ve done Mr Spalding’s creations justice by at least getting the minor details correct. This is the type of restaurant you shouldn’t read about folks, obviously blogs will gush over the technicalities, but there was so much information to process in one sitting, that I doubt I’ve presenting a full picture of the experience. Other than to point my thumbs skywards and take a few snaps to help your decision of course. That’s my part done. If the idea of Roganic intrigues, you should visit, and make up your own mind about it. It’s that sort of place, and I guarantee you that at the very least, you will come away with a few new memories of first times.

The Deets

Roganic
£50 to £100 pp
19 Blandford St, W1U 3DH
Tel: 0207 4860380

Organically written-up elsewhere: GT , TCC , TSB

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you cansubscribe to the RSS feed.

The things people do to track down a good meal, this one in particular involves my first encounter with the Lucky Chip burger. As you know, summers are pretty up and down every year, we remember the odd day when the thermometer crosses the psychological 100F mark, but we tend to forget that mostly, it’s just very wet. So there we were, Mark with his gentlemenly brolly, and me with my … FT Weekend Magazine… (ironically, this weekend’s was the Food issue including a feature on the slow death of the Bib, and a short Heston interview) and soaked Marni blazer (sniffers) , we were traipsing up and down London fields to find this rather elusive, and well hidden Netil Market, and mindful that the mild drizzle – like a balloon slowly filling with water – was about to burst into a proper rainstorm.

After a little tinkering with google maps, we circled onto Westgate Street as the entry point to Netil Market. So we found it eventually, quite modest, in a rather small car park, but as it had been raining all afternoon, it wasn’t a surprise to find the vendors packing up their stock to shield from it. The sight of the Lucky Chip van was modestly uneventful, and given the street food craze, it’s quite a change coming across an empty food truck with good internet gossip. Manned by one, there were a couple of tables around it, one table in particular was shifted under a market stall tent, which we both thought was a good idea to duck into. So we ordered, and sat down, before long our worst fears were realised, the metaphorical water balloon had burst and it was as if wet bombs broke upon impact on the tent. What a day for al fresco dining, but no amount of rain dampened our appetites, when this landed on our table:

Single with Cheese, £6.00.

Looks familiar doesn’t it? Yeah it does bear a semblance to the now mythical Meat Wagon/Easy effort, what with the melted cheese oozing around the seemingly hand formed patty enclosed within a steamed bun.

The patty was juicy and well seasoned, not too beefy but not too bland either. All the pre-requisite fixings were all present. The burger was a tad too leaky but I think it’s probably down to a merely adequate bun, which could be a little better at soaking up the juices, but all in all, we found our burgers to be quite good. In fact, we thought they were really good.

I’m not going to get more technical than the above, because I’m not a bloody burger expert (then again, is anyone really?) , but I think you’ll find there is substance to the Lucky Chip burger, which for me resembled a Meat Wagon experience, ie, if I hadn’t already just completed a marathon 10 courses at Roganic, I would have easily gone for a couple more.

The good thing about Lucky Chip is that it is still relatively free from hype right this moment, so you won’t have to queue for hours just for a burger.

Wasabi Mayo and Ginger Sweet Chilli Fries, £3.5

What we did think was a cut above the competition were these hand cut fries. Bursting with mashy, rich potato flavours, so much so that we didn’t actually think it required all the salt it came with. In fact, when you do eventually make it to Lucky Chip, be sure to get the chips unsalted. The asian influenced condiments – wasabi and sweet chilli – were an effective touch.

Lucky Chip has only been around for about 3 months, they were ‘born’ in Kensal Rise (so to speak) trading a couple of days of the week from Kensal Rise church, but circumstances are such that it has forced them to found their now permanent spot in Netil Market. From our brief chat with the bearded Lucky Chip owner (one of two I think) , he told us they are in the middle of renegotiating their bread suppliers to somebody more local than their current guy out west in Park Royal.

We paid £15.50 for two burgers and the fries.

If you are searching for the contender which can go toe to toe with the Meat Wagon burger, I think this is it. Lucky Chip has got a great product on their hands, the patty in particular is great, and once it secures the perfect East London baked brioche or sourdough bun, I think it will have all the ammunition to fill the interwebs with pictures of its juicy burger. They are at Netil Market most days (except Mondays I think) from lunch hour through to 10pm, and I urge you to brave the rain and hit the food truck.

PS: Daniel – Perhaps a tie-up with BurgerMondays?

The Deets

Lucky Chip
£6 a burger
Netil Market,
Westgate Street
London Fields,
E8 3RL
Ben – 07795816355

Did you enjoy reading this? You can subscribe to the Newsletter. Alternatively, you cansubscribe to the RSS feed.