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

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Newsflash. If you local to Finchley Road, you need to find this Korean restaurant. As far as I can tell, the 50% discount for their BBQ menu looks permanent. I’ve already been twice, and I think it’s a great value for money. So this discount may be some sort of shrewd marketing to undercut glitzier counterparts in central London, and in those terms, it doesn’t quite have the setting to match more expensive haunts. This place is modest budget stuff. Having said that, the 50% discount is incredibly generous. One shouldn’t expect to be see dry aged beef or lobster, but for the money, the quality of the meats is adequate. Certainly not worse that Koba.

As a way of introduction, the Korean BBQ experience involves cooking sizzling meat over a hot pan dug out from a hole in the middle of the table, and if you’ve yet to try it, you should, it is one of life’s greatest pleasures.

The rest of the menu is brief, in relation to Central London counterparts that is, but all the essentials are present. Like the kimchee, the seafood pancake, the soup, the glass noodles and amazingly, there are only three variants of the bibimbap : cooked beef, raw beef or vegetarian.

They spent little time worrying about , the décor is numbingly plain, like a shabby café, its lean, mean, it’ll get the job done.

There were some freebie appetizers that came in the form of pickled vegetables and some sort of jelly which I suppose were made from mung beans. With the massive discounts, we ordered a prime rib eye (£6.80 down from £9.00) , a marinated rib eye (£4.50 from £9) , marinated chicken (£4 from £8) and thinly sliced pork belly (£4 from £8).

Can’t say that cooking was poor, since it was yours truly controlling the timing and there’s something strangely therapeutic about watching sizzling meat cook over a Korean BBQ. The marinated meats were nothing spectacular, carrying a sweet undertones to it, but it got the job done. Portions were incredibly generous. For an average of £4 per portion, it is mind-boggling how they are cutting a profit from this. I enjoyed the meat feast thoroughly.

As nice as Koba is, I’m quite glad to pay half the money for half price sizzle. Everybody should have a dependable Korean bbq in the neighbourhood. It goes a long way in wiping away those mid week blues.

I also ordered the Dolsot Bibimbap, with raw beef and raw egg, £9.50 and the kimchee hotpot, £7.50.

The pattern was beginning to emerge – the restaurant is incredibly generous with portions, so much so, they may as well be giving out food away for free. Look at that mountain of beef..! The dolsot was really hot, so as I stirred the mix (personally, I use very little gochujang) , the heat just about cooked the meat and egg. I waited for the rice round the corners to turned gold and crispy, and was glad that they did – think crispy rice like chips. There was so much beef, that I managed to pick up more beef than rice with every spoonful. It’s almost too generous.

Bibimbaps are like the perfect companion dishes to a Korean BBQ. It’s one of the great dishes, wickedly basic in composition, something anyone with a hot pot could whip up at home. And yet it is something that I’d happily order in a restaurant. They are like great bowl of chips to accompany a juicy porterhouse. Before I forget, the soup was satistfactory, too.

In the end, dinner for two came to £46.53, which includes £6 for two bottles of Korean beer.. Hite. The restaurant is amazing value for money, I’ll be honest, food nor selection is stellar, but the essential items are more than adequate. All in all, I thought it was a decent meal that won’t break any wallets, and I think it really is worth a visit if you so happen to wander into Swiss Cottage. For those of you local to the area, like me, make this your Friday night routine. I’m hoping the half off bbq deal is here to stay as it is simply stunning value. How they’ll manage to stay profitable is beyond me, but perhaps that’s reason alot to visit more often.

The Gist of It

Seoul
Korean, £20pp
289 Finchley Road NW3 6ND
Tel : (020) 7794 9099
Tube: Swiss Cottage

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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

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When everyone including dear Ol’ Uncle B has visited this restaurant, that’s when you know the interwebs has taken to showering yet another crowd pleaser with its ever expanding vocabulary of praise words. “Wondrous”. “Decadent”. “Moorish”. “Decadent”. “Sinful”. “Ultimate comfort food”. Adjectives, which I too, am guilty of overusing. Cynicism aside, a restaurant that has collected as many reviews as it has since it’s April debut, must be doing something right.

Somehow, I had managed to avoid the 50% discount circus, though the full asking price wasn’t too bad. To grease the wheels, we started with not one, but two plates (£1.50 each) of their excellent warm, crusty and soft sourdough (ironically, warm bread is abit of a rarity in London restaurants) served with some excellent artichoke puree, which i gather is, must be made in house.

I ordered one of their fresh juices, the ‘invigorate’ of pineapple, apple, lime and strawberries. Sadly it was anything but invigorating… and note to self, never drink pineapple and strawberry juice from the same glass. Service was a little jumpy, but well intentioned, they had a tendency to take things away before we were done with them, like the wedge of pineapple, which I had initially wanted to savour when I finished my juice, for instance.

Believe the hype, the decor is absolutely top class. Like the Tardis, it’s unimpressive on the outside, but surprisingly spacious on its inside. The ambiance is genuinely genial, marvellous convivial, like garlic peppering away on a hot pan; this is a hot brasserie bouncing with soul, you want to get up on your two left feet and turn out your best James Brown impression. Get on up indeed.

The small plates, oh the dreaded small plates. The revolution is over, because it’s already taken over the capital. Small plates is such common place now, it’s a surprise when one doesn’t come across a new opening that doesn’t have them on the menu. The small places are fall into three categories: £3, £4 and £5.

Veal & pork sausage, lentils, mustard, sage, £4.

Damn it’s tiny. I doubt these four tiny wedges actually join to make a whole sausage. It tasted good enough, but there wasn’t anything truly genuine about this. I feel the frazzle, I appreciate the glitz, but a sausage split four ways, on a bed of lentils? For £4?. Questionable.

Baby squid, chorizo, smoked paprika, chilli, olive, £4.

and

Chicory, pear, radish, gorgonzola, £3.

The chicory salad was nice, freshing with the schweet pear and the creamy blue cheese; the baby squid was also nice enough, but I was annoyed at literal the small plates were. Granted they were well priced, and cooked well enough, they were boring, and there was little to speak about really. Bubblegum pop.

Chermoula spiced poussin, jalapeno, lemon, £5.

We approach uncharted territory, the £5 plates look like more effort has gone into them, and what a difference £1 makes then. Nicely grilled yes, I’m not sure about the chermoula spices, ie, either the species were shy or a little absent. The cous cous were nice enough. Not quite Yalla-Yalla, maybe Yalla-Yalla-esque, but again, I just don’t understand how this dish ties into the RHC theme, or at all.

Steak tartare, toasts, £5.

By this dish, we were feeling rather full, and quite frankly, we couldn’t complain about the food. There was nothing wrong with the cooking, it tasted good enough, but it also felt incidental. Not enough capers in this tartare, but it’s roughly chopped, alot of citrus, like the rest of the dishes, vibrant, but generally speaking under-seasoned, and missing an egg yolk.

Rack of Pork £14.50
lentils, smoked sausage, horseradish

FINALLY. All the faffing about with the forgettable small plates, the meal begins apropo with the pork chop. Working my way through the small dishes, I was searching for credibility, and I found very little to supporting evidence, which was in total contrast to this dish. But first, I scrapped away the white elephant on the plate, a huge dollop of horseradish cream, ugh, citrus heavy, ugh. I think it’s OK to have the horseradish the side, but I just couldn’t understand why the chef would want to mask his wonderfully grilled rack of pork with that stuff. Mysterious.

The pork was well cooked, just slightly pink in the centre, very juicy, and the crackling was jawbreakingly superb. I’m not the greatest fan of lentils, it’s the taste of beans or peas, it tends to soak up just too much moisture and it drowns out flavour with its own rather drab, and rather dreary flavour, and so I felt the lentils were an unnecessary addition to the pork, it’s already wonderful by itself, it didn’t need the distraction. As I worked through the huge hunk of pig, I discovered three rather curious slices of what appeared to be sausage. WHY? What was the meaning of hiding sliced sausage under the massive pork chop? The mind boggles. I finished by sucking the last bits of meat from the bone. Juicy, but man this dish was strange. Great pork, but perhaps it was just me missing the point, but I thought the recipe was a right mess. Was it meant to be fusion of some kind? Peter Gordon-esque?

Hot Fudge Sundae £6
Macaroons, honeycomb

I liked the pudding, the fudge was really hot, and there was alot of it in the glass. The honeycomb was great, very sweet stuff, especially comforting with an americano.

We paid £63.56 inclusive of service for two.

When you do visit, please steer clear of the small plates, I didn’t actually think they were particularly bad, it’s just they were so tiny, and not particularly outstanding. If you want to share small plates of proper food in a cracking environment, head toward Opera Tavern instead. In my opinion, what RHC are doing with their small plates is working toward (finally) killing the bloody small plates revolution, which has gone on for far too many years. Those recipes were all over the place.

On the other hand, the main dishes looked much better. Of course, I only had one dish, but seeing the fish and chips and burgers roll out of the kitchen, it seemed evident that the £14ish average asking price for the large portioned mains are more than justified. This is the dilemma I have with the food at RHC, the cooking was more than adequate, but you know, part of a good dish is – in my humble opinion – also down to having consistent, well thought out and generally good recipes. If anything, I felt the inspiration behind the food was a little lacking, the philosophy a tad undisciplined. Eating was more a chore than a joy.

I must give it massive props for style. In fact, the decor is so fresh that both the missus and I agreed that we would definitely like to return, for it is simply is a great place to hang out. The squirrel wall lamps are a nice touch, but it were the bold orange leather seats, that made the visit worthwhile. Everything looks fresh, hip and modern here, in fact, the atmosphere is so lively that you really have to visit it for yourself to really experience how cool it can make you feel.

So it’s a real shame that a paradox exists with the Riding House Cafe: That the ambiance possesses all the sass of the modern London all day diner, its a shame the food doesn’t come imbued with the same pizzazz.

The Gist of It

The Riding House Cafe
British £35pp.
43-51 Great Titchfield St W1W 7PQ
Tel : 020 7927 0840
Tube : Oxford Circus

Also riding in the carousel : Winkypedia ; Life Outside The Viewfinder ; The Hardens ; Metro; Hg2Blog ; Bellaphon ; Nordic Nibbler ; The Prodigal Guide ; GT

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Remarkable. The standard of cooking is dastardly high, the artistry kept well in check, the flavours were – in my opinion – calibrated to run riot on your palate, that it made for a breathtaking dining experience. Service took an equally disciplined yet playful approach as the cooking, and so too was the decor; lime green and quite so basic, but refreshing and pressure-free. The only question I kept asking myself throughout the meal was “What’s the catch?”. Why is it so damn affordable.

As I understand it, this modern restaurant offers their three course ala carte menu at a princely sum of £25 during lunch, and the same menu for £38 during dinner. Not that I’m complaining of course, but after a string of new openings (NOPI and Pollen St Social and even St John Hotel) that seem to indicate the return of the swinging binge-times, Medlar’s prices come as a welcomed surprise.

You and I should pay attention to Medlar partly because of the pedigree behind the team. In the hotseat is one Joe Mercer Nairne, previous sous-chef at Chez Bruce and before that, The Savoy Grill. Managing front of house affairs, is the very charming David O’Connor whose CV involved running the teams at The Ledbury, The Square and also Chez Bruce (all of which are Nigel Platts-Martin restaurants) , where he and Joe first forged their friendship, and eventually hatched their plans for gastro-domination with Medlar. Presumably of course.

The ambiance is that of the perfect neighbourhood restaurant. Considering the apparently high average disposable income, it is ironic that King’s Road lacks credible places to dine, so Medlar is actually very good news for this part of town. What do we have here? Sushinho? Confused and tiresome Brazilian-Japanese fusion. Bluebird and it’s ever expanding premises? More style than substance. Made in Italy? Massive pizzas, but a brand of restaurants nearing its twilight, imho. I would be surprised if the King’s Road branch of Byron is not raking in the millions. Lest I forget, there is the Cadogan Arms. That’s semi-decent.

But not as decent as this. Check this out: New season’s asparagus with soft polenta, poached pheasant’s egg, St Georges and Mrs Kirkham’s ; Chilled courgette, chervil and oyster soup with preserved lemon and flowers ; Halibut with petits pois a la Francaise, lardo, radishes, baby gem and jersey royals ; Under blade fillet with persillade snails, salad, triple cooked chips and béarnaise. Starters and mains which could easily slip into a Michelin starred menu for fifty quid; but here, they are part of a £25 lunch menu. £38 when the sun goes down. I drank a glass of (£9) American pinot, La Crema, Sonoma Coast, USA, 2008. So jammy sweet that they as well have supplied my fat burgundy glass with a straw. Silkenly genial.

Duck egg tart with red wine sauce, turnip purée, lardons, young sorrel and sautéed duck heart

Wow. Layers upon layers of flavour. Runny duck egg yolk, a thin (and buttery) filo pastry, spinach (i think), make up the tart. There was strength and maturity in flavour, it was redolent of a well sourced Camembert or perhaps even an Epoisses. The rich red wine sauce only served to amplify the wonderful complexity of the tart. Rich flavour nicely complimented the rubbery texture of the duck hearts and mushrooms. Forest foraged brawn, on a plate. Mmm.

I was told that this was their most popular starter, and with good reason. It’s a real winner, and probably on its way to becoming a future signature dish. I showed my appreciation by mopping up the last of the sauce, with the excellent in house foccacia.

Roast cod with artichokes barigoule, borlotti beans, mussels and rouille… and extra triple cooked chips.

Rejoice, rejoice. What perfectly cooked fish. The crust was coarse and crispy, but underneath, the insides were so silkenly flaky, that tearing the flakes of flesh from the loin, was as slippery smooth as changing gears in a Ferrari. A presumptuous reference, of course. Getting this sort of consistency with the fish – just slightly undercooked centre – is extremely difficult. That sort of masterstroke cooking is exactly why you pay money to eat out.

The broth of summer vegetables was inherently sweet, and the chef had managed to eek out all the wonderful stocky warmth from the ingredients, the juice gave the fish a wonderful coat of moistness that is on par with many of the capital’s most established restaurants, Zafferano included, since I had a fish dish there recently.

The triple cooked chips were good, crusty and powdery, but probably just a little below the superiority of Blumenthal’s effort. Although the killer bearnaise was as described. Vinegary egged whipped, fresh!

My only criticism with this dish was that it had too many slices of carrots, and not enough artichokes.

Nonetheless, this is graceful cooking. Triumphant, exultant and supremely confident and admirable stuff. Most of all, it was a right joy lapping it up. Very near perfection (whatever that may be) , and in my opinion, this is at least a one star dish.

Elderflower sorbet with redcurrants and freshly baked madeleines.

Gooey, syrupy and sticky, I was slightly puzzled about the pairing of the zesty sorbet and the doughy Madelines, but individually they were superb. The madeleines took their time to come out from the kitchen, but it was worth it. Warm, fluffy, dense, like the smell of freshly baked pop-corn. I thought St John madeleines were perfect, but these came very close to dislodging that line of thought.

I paid £38.25 for the solo lunch, food, wine and service included.

What remarkable quality of food, what an admirably tireless smile from the waiters and what genial soulfulness from the ambiance. It’s a restaurant that one could easily fall in love with, and one which I desperately wished was closer to me, or at least further up the road and away from World’s End.

It is the perfect neighbourhood restaurant, period. This is King’s Road’s finest hour in gastronomy, and I do not believe there are no finer points in this price bracket.

The talent behind the restaurant may have been honed in the rigorous tradition of star chasing ways, but I believe that David and Joe have chosen to break away from the tiresome ponce of tradition and have created what is – in my opinion – a modern restaurant designed for diners who simply love gastronomy for the act of eating great cooking, and not for the glamour of eating out. This is not a temple to worship the skill of a chef, it is a temple to celebrate one’s love for food.

On reflection, there is one other restaurant which is similar to Medlar, and that’s Bryn William’s Odettes in Primrose Hill. The philosophy is similar, congenial atmosphere, eye popping technical points in cooking, modern yet hearty recipes and a front of house who are there to charm your boots off, as they fill them with the glorious food.

There are few restaurants that feature such clarity in its cooking, and I think I’ve mentioned the C words enough times through this post. If Medlar doesn’t get some kind of New Restaurant Award, or a mention on a National critic’s end of year list, I would be quite shocked. I am aware that this post is based on only three dishes, so you’ll have to wait for the subsequent visits if you still want to know if I think it is a serious contender. I will follow up with more thoughts in the coming weeks. But while I do that, I highly recommend you make Medlar a top priority for your next stop in your own list of must visit restaurants.

The Gist of It

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

Elsewhere : Metro ; Andy Hayler ; Felix Hirsch ; Fay Maschler , Guy Dimond

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Ever since the Great British Pound took its glorious tumble following the economic rodeo of ’08, travelling the world with HM in your pocket doesn’t go as far as it used to no more, all my assets doing an extended shrinking violet number. Ta-da.

Picture the shock and horror whilst researching prices at top end restaurants in Singapore; Waku Ghin – Tetsuya’s Singaporean operation – a whopper of a SGD$400 (£200) per pop; FiftyThree, the well-regarded Euro-comfortica for a mere SGD$250 (£125), yikes..! Shinji – the Raffles Hotel pre-eminent shrine of haute sushi starts at SGD$220 (£110) and flattens out at SGD$450 (£225). Gosh, fine dining sure is pricy in Singapore.

All rather paradoxical considering this is a country better known for its amazing standard of hawker centres, food courts, char kuey tiaw, chilli crab, pratha, kaya jam, hainanese chicken rice, nasi padang just to name a few commonly accessible, easily affordable, delicious one platers.

Perhaps it is to do with the fascination, mystique and romance of the sycophantic fantasy propagated by high-rolling guides – the Michelin, the Miele and the World Top 50, all of which appear to back the idea that the quality of indulgence be measured not only by how well the food is cooked; but also by the expense spared in investing the restaurant’s cabinet of Laguiole knives and the completeness of their Le Creuset collection.

Obviously I respect these ranking guides, and if we believe these industry benchmarks, then Iggy’s is not only Singapore’s finest, but also the undisputed King of Asia (as described in Miele’s top Asian restaurants list) , bettering the best of HK, Taipei – a proposition that intrigues and puzzles. No disrespect to Iggy’s of course, but I doubt the best of S’pore can outdo the best of HK. Also named the world’s 28th best restaurant (bettering Keller’s The French Laundry and Robuchon’s Parisian workshop).

The owner is one very accomplished super sommelier – whose CV is as glittering as his awards cabinet – Ignatius Chan, who has stinted in many a luxury hotel previous to his eponymous debut in 2004, firstly at The Regent, and in late 2010, relocating to The Hilton.

A mammoth reputation to the tune of SGD$250 (£125), complete with the unfamiliar ‘++’ postscript for the ‘Gastronomic Menu’. I took my parents because all three of us were anxious as to what the allegedly best restaurant in Asia could produce. It didn’t take us long to start feeling that the weight of such high expectation was going to fail us inevitably: No a la carte for dinner service.

For a venue as new as this, I was shocked at how Nineties the décor was. Windowless, drab, dim, soul sapping, featureless and formless, dull greys and browns, just so damn business-like that I doubt even Gordon Gekko would consider this as his office.

Frosted glass auto-sliding doors, which – every time a waiter had to access the kitchen – gave diners a glimpse into the inner workings of the kitchen. Which was bright, colourful, cheerful and filled with files and cookbooks. Like cooking in heaven, and dining in hell no? Come now restaurateurs, in this day and age, elegance can be funky too, no? This type of establishment is just so boring to eat in.

First, SQUID. Sea urchin, dashi, ohba flowers.

Squidgy and fresh, bitter yet citrusy with a burst of the fragrance of freshly picked flowers. A subtle, if rather uneventful, uncooked start to the meal.

Second, KOHADA. Tomato, Clementine, mango, quinoa, beet.

Visually, the dish was beautifully, the tiny tomatoes were the size of a match head, strangely pulling my attention. Kohada – we were told – belonged to the herring family, here it seemed as though it was either poached or pickled, but I couldn’t really tell, because there was so little of it. The fillets measured no more an an inch across. Bursting summery fruity flavours, the clementine in particular was blindingly apparent on the palate. While I thought the subtle interplay of gentle flavours and textures was mildy entertaining, I also thought of how little cooking was involved, and thought how this dish was utterly pretentious and ridiculously tiny. Let’s see now £125 / 8 = £15. That’s expensive.

Third, SOUTHERN BLUE FIN TUNA. Carrot, watermelon, radish, bottarga.

Southern blue fin tuna…damn, it’s good. It’s more than just good, it was amazing. The texture was buttery smooth, I could hardly believe I was having the loin and not the belly. It tasted so alive. Leading me to wonder about the grade of tuna which Atari-ya imports into the UK.

I don’t think I’ve had Southern Blue Fin ever before, because I don’t think I’ve ever come across such a high quality tuna sashimi in London that has left with the same arresting impression.

We must address the issue of conservation, as unfortunately, this fish is critically endangered, because of people like you and I who crave it as we do.

Anyway, the rest of the fruit and vegetable medley was another summer on a plate. It served as a nice foundation to spruce up the sticks of prized tuna. I thought it was a nice exercise in texture, a syrupy, horseradish-like sauce, a chopped and grated salad, like the best tuna sashimi salad I’d ever tried, but therein was the problem, this was no more than a glorified sashimi salad.

I thought the recipe lacked guile and imagination, it was so easy to eat – all two spoonfuls of it – that it simply felt complacent. There was little doubt that this kitchen was very capable at slicing, dicing and plating, but my nose detected nothing and consequently I felt there was too little flavour involved with this kind of dish.

It was neither Japanese, nor European, and it certainly was not Chinese. Throughout the meal, I struggled with Iggy’s inspiration for his recipes, I felt they were erring dangerously close to being Pan-Asian, and truth be told, it did not feel Japanese, it felt – and I don’t mean this in the bad way – like a glorified vegetarian taster menu.

Fourth, QUAIL. Foie gras, faro, peas, mushroom.

So far, it has been a turtle-speed start to the meal. Three courses in, about three quarters of an hour sat there in a half empty dining room that was catering to no more than ten patrons. I’d hardly felt like I ate anything, and I wondered why food took so long to prepare. Aside from expertly sourced seafood, I’d not tasted any evidence that suggested this kitchen deserved to be Asia’s best.

Here we see some semblance of eurocentric Michelin inspiration. Firstly, excellently seared quail, nice cast-iron flavours, sealed juices and such, and kudos on pairing with umami rich ingredients including the mushroom and peas. Sadly though, I thought the dish failed as a whole. The selection of mushrooms were ordinary, barely cooked, so there was little in the flavour department. Again, ridiculously tiny portions, and I was shocked at the size of the foie gras, roughly the size and shape of a dice. I have never eaten such a poor foie gras dish, with so little of it, in a restaurant of such pretense before.

At this point, I wondered if the kitchen had merely added the duck liver to the recipe to make it sound posh, rather than make it an integral part of the recipe, which in this case, it wasn’t. Particularly poor was the pea puree, too thin and tannic , like the skin of the peas on my palate, and it lacked any potency in flavour. It was more like pea soup than a sauce designed to hold the dish together. No fire in this lake. I’ll say that this dish was very easy to eat, but I think it was easy to eat, because it lack so much. An empty recipe.

Fifth, ABALONE. Koshihikari rice, Perigord black truffle.

This was probably the best dish on the night. While it didn’t look like much, all three ingredients were majorly high end. Firstly, the koshihikari was amazingly. Superbly smooth, creamy and yet maintaining the individuality of each and every grain. I couldn’t ascertain as to whether this was US grown or Japanese, but it’s better than the Japanese Koshihikari I’ve cooked at home. Truffle shaved like sea weed, along with a luxurious braised abalone sauce gave way to a immensely powerful flavour profile that attacked the palatte. Pure umami.

Being Chinese – and given that we were in Singapore – I was disappointed we were not served whole abalone. Countable diced abalone is bad form, considering the setting. Come now, how difficult is it to source Taiwanese baby abalones? And even that’s low end. My dad recounted his experience of abalone at Ah Yat seafood , and did not have much nice words to say about this dish. If you’re going to put a banquet ingredient on the menu, at least do it with style. If this was say, a £10 dish at a more egalitarian setting (think Brawn), then I would say fucking wow. But at this level, I’m afraid it’s a monumental fail.

Sixth, WAGYU. Olive tapenade, Yukon gold potato.

Our waiter insisted the wagyu striploin was from Japan (whether it was Kobe or not, I could not confirm) and not Oz, with marbling score of 9 to 9.5. We were given Laguiole knives with metal hilts, which I was certain we didn’t need if indeed it was Japanese Wagyu.

Seared to just about medium. First impressions were that the meat was very oily. Was it that all the gorgeous fat had melted away? What remained, was disappointingly chewy, and strangely, it was devoid of flavour and distinctly lacked beefiness. The potato puree on the side was disgusting. It was too creamy, too buttery, too salty and too oily. Why the need for such an overpowering potato mash? Shouldn’t the natural quality of the beef be allowed to shine rather than be drowned out?

It looked as if the meat and potatoes sat on a strange clear, blubber-like sauce, like congealed oil, leaving me feeling queasy at the end of the meal. As it was the last of the cooked dishes, what appeared to be the most premium ingredient on the menu, also appeared to be the weakest. That potato tasted as bad as it looked. I couldn’t believe it was Wagyu, let alone being Japanese. Simply put, one of the worst beef dishes I have ever eaten.

Seventh, IGGY’S POP. Passion fruit, mandarin vodka, vincotto, gorgonzola.

This was nothing more than a two-staged palate cleanser, firstly with a white chocolate truffle with a liquid vodka centre, and then a kind of macaroon with an iced passionfruit filling. Yawn.

Eighth, WINTER. Chestnut, coconut, coffee, lemon.

To finish, chestnut ice cream that was alright, and shaved coconut, perhaps like the soil and sand stuff they do in molecular gastronolabs, with but a slight coffee infusion to wake us from the snore-fest of a meal.

We paid something ridiculous like $880 (£440) for three and we didn’t even order any wine.

Sobering. One of the poorest pricy meals I’ve ever eaten. I received a major bollocking from my parents for recommending Asia’s best restaurant to them, that’s how poor the meal was.

It was so pretentious, it intimidates with the mob of waiters and constant cutlery swapping and grown-up ambiance that as a diner, you are bullied into thinking that this setting means that any food that comes out from the shrine that is called the kitchen has to be food fit for kings. A woeful reminder of a time of out of control excess, when misplaced values didn’t matter. How this was a meal at the world’s 28th best restaurant is beyond me. Self-indulgence had got the better of the chefs, seemingly living in their own bubble, complacent with reputation, more in love with how their food looked than how it was cooked. I think somewhere along the way, someone had forgotten about creating recipes that married wild and fantastic flavours to create new, previously unheralded flavours. Where were the signature dishes? What were the combo revelations that has had industry insiders cooing in unison? What was I suppose to take away from this ‘gastronomic’ meal? It was neither the tediously illuminating dissecting light that molecular gastronomy shines upon the subject, forcing an education upon the palate; nor was it boundary pushing, rule bending, inventive marriage of world cuisines, which should have been, of the unpigeon-holeable fusion cuisine that Iggy’s strived to create. It was neither here nor there. I think what was most disappointing was that it seemed as though the kitchen had talent, but that this talent appeared to be mis-directed.

Singapore is a country full of highly competitive hawker centres that have to woo customers the old fashioned way: great food and value for money. Specialty one-plate dishes all have their own family recipes and unique twists, like the various versions of chicken rice for example, so I’d imagine that Iggy’s would at least show some of this national pride in cooking. So I was scratching my head as to what was so great about Iggy’s. What was I paying for? A lesson in food styling perhaps?

Maybe at one point in its lifetime, Iggy’s was deserved of its reputation, but if this meal was anything to go by, it was certainly the epilogue to the magnum opus. No apparent pursuit of breaking new ground, just a set of safe, labored and downright boring dishes, which were very much less that the superb provenance of ingredients it was built around. I fell asleep eating the food. The food was so clinical, that it lacked any genuine heart and soul. Gimmick ridden, flashy and too little fire. My apologies if you’re a fan but I just didn’t like it.

The next day, my parents and I cancelled our booking at FiftyThree, we didn’t want to take the risk of being wallet-raped again, and besides, French food probably tastes better in France anyway. We decided to eat the rest of our meals from food courts while shopping in Orchard Road. Much more of a gastronomic discovery, with better ambiance, fuller stomachs and at a fraction of the asking price at Iggy’s.

The Gist of It

Iggy’s
Fusion, SGD$250 + 10% service + 7% GST
The Hilton Hotel
581 Orchard Road
Singapore 238883
Flight: SIA SQ322

Eggy: GT ; Sparkling or Still ; No Expert

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It was probably the most intriguing restaurant opening last year. It generated a polarising reception, ranging from those who hailed Nuno Mendes’ travelling fusion food as groundbreaking to others who thought it a purely self indulgent public experiment, injected with an unhealthy dose of pretense. When I visited last summer, I thought the food was innovative, there were dishes which were memorable for ingenuity and flaccidity, in equal measure. There is no question of Nuno’s talents, his recipes show great potential; at the time, I felt all that was needed was maturation time. A revisit was always on the cards – it was one of my favourite meals in 2010 – and I was keen to see if Viajante had morphed into a well oiled machine, going into the New Year. Especially with the impending release of the revision to the Michelin Guide due next week.

I opted for a late lunch last Sunday. Nuno was not leading the service on the day of rest. In the former Bethnal Green town hall, it exudes a stoic, artist’s loft, air of zen kind of ambiance. The calming surrounding being a large aspect of Viajante’s appeal. It is like theatre in the way the entire mechanics of the kitchen being fully visible to diners. A little surprising how silent the kitchen is… and ironic how little ‘cooking’ seems to be taking place. You would easily mistake the chefs to be an army of uniformed and glorified food stylists.

I’m suppose to be saving up for an impending holiday in a couple of weeks to try some nice restaurants in Singapore, so we opted for the 3 course menu (£28) over the six (£60). I drank a glass of Aligote, a lesser used white grape varietal from Burgundy, £8. While the structure of the menus remain as ‘blind tasters’, they have tweaked its presentation (from my first meal) , with take home menus that describe the dishes.

I’ll keep the commentary to a minimum from this point forward, since I’ve done a review at length before.

A flurry of amuse bouches to start, the now signature ‘thai explosion’, a crispy mini curry chicken sandwich, gets the juices flowing.

Bread and Butter.

They had added a new black pudding flavoured brown butter in added to the chicken skin, iberico ham shavings and purple potato powder. Both are great, I prefer the purple one, it’s salty, as opposed to the black pudding one, which tasted sweeter. Both have an amazingly fluffy texture, close to whipped cream.

Confit Salmon, Miso paste, dashi.

Some dishes are brought to tables personally by the presiding chefs, and at every point in the meal, there is a sense of wonder as you lean in to listen to the exposition, since the menu is a surprise. They usually end their description of the dish by ladling the necessary juices on, making for quite a dramatic introduction.

The dish wouldn’t be out of place in a Japanese restaurant. Confit salmon – perhaps sous-vide – was delicately cooked, the texture of which very raw, not unlike sashimi, or even a cut of tzar-cut fillet. The dashi soup was brimming with bright savoury flavours, piercing and mellow at the same time. It’s a very elegant dish, and very accomplished. Being a fan of raw food in general, I liked this.

Roast Duck, beetroot and pistachio.

Art on a plate? Or just controlled chaos?

The flavour combinations .. like a forest in your mouth .. and the interacting textures of the various vegetables were in its own class. The effervescent beetroot sauce was superb and I thought it matched the duck very well. Duck was cooked on point, pink, with well sealed juices, but perhaps it needed abit of pounding. It was tough and chewy. Aside from that, I liked it.

Sea buckthorn and burnt meringue.

The fruit of sea buckthorn look like satsumas, these particular ones were sourced from France, we were told. Made into a slushy sorbet, it tasted like a shrubby and herby orange, something which cleansed the palate well. The oddly shaped meringue was confusing, and I’m not entirely certain what the chef is trying to say with the styling. Whatever it was, I think it demonstrated that the line between class and rubbish, is thin. Great meringue though. Sticky and syrupy and sugary. This dish really reminded me of those orange-vanilla ice cream popsicles from my childhood. Not sure what you call those things, but I remember sucking on them on hot days. Mmm.

Frozen maple pannacotta and shiso granite with green apple.

I loved the dessert course. The iced pannacotta tasted…as you’d expect frozen pannacotta to taste. The mint-like shiso ice shavings was another nod to Japanese cuisine. Cubes of green apple took away the edge off the pannacotta, bridging the divergent flavours of the shiso and the milk-based ice cream rather nicely.

Petit fours, coffee.

We threw them a curve ball by requesting for soya milk in our flat whites, and they handled that without a hitch. Hats off to the tremendously professional service, from the moment they took my reservation on the phone – you can hear him smiling on the other end – to the non-intrusive and relaxed attitude throughout service.

Petit fours of creme catalan with the fragrance of shaved nutmeg (I think), a white chocolate truffle, with shavings of black truffle and some sort of marshmallow.

We paid £131.63 for 3 , or £44 each. It a tremendously well valued lunch, considering the array of freebies which supplement the 3 standard courses. Oh and water was on the house too, with a choice of still or sparkling. Brilliant no?

About the only thing we regretted was not taking our coffee in the sexy looking Viajante bar, across the hall from the restaurant.

A convincing show, even with this abbreviated menu, I think in the 9 months or so, Viajante has continued to polish its potential as one the exciting new restaurants in London. I think it ticks the right boxes, it is very different in execution; and conceptually I think it breaks new ground when compared to many of the serious restaurants in town. Which tend to be quite disciplined in following traditional European standards.

Anyway, Viajante is on the right track. It might win a star next week, or perhaps it won’t. The bib is ever unpredictable year on year. Whatever the case, I heartily recommend you try Viajante if you haven’t already.

The Gist of It

Viajante
Portuguese Fusion, £28 for 3, £60 for 6
Patriot Square E2 9NF
Tel: 020 7871 0461
Tube: Bethnal Green

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The sheer volume of blogposts on Bob Bob Ricard throughout 2010 made the interwebs quite a homogeneous place to read about new things. For a moment in time, BBR was perhaps the trendiest all day, all-booth, Anglo diner in London, complete with champagne push buttons and a power outlet for the laptop wielding gastrophile. I’d imagine it is so you could blog about your meal, as you ate. I won’t do a full write-up on this well-liked restaurant in Soho, because you’ve probably read about it, but I will show you the photographs I took on my first (yes, my first) visit to the restaurant.

I avoided the circus when it rolled into town, and was perfectly happy to avoid altogether, but then Mark put together a very strong case for BBR (telling me it is the quintessential Soho diner), and he convinced me to have a go at it (preferably with ripped jeans and flip flops), with a rather impromptu, late Sunday lunch in the mid afternoon, so he could hand me some sausages stuffed with mushrooms, something he picked up from a recent visit to France.

And it was. The interior design was glamorous alright. Blue leather booths, polished brass, tiled floor, darkly lit, brown and very chic. Service came draped in a golden-hued tie, an off-pink blazer and an ear to ear smile. Mark has visited on more than one occasion, and service is a particular highlight at BBR, it seems. We felt comfortable indeed.

Finally, the food…oh gosh, the food was – surprisingly – brilliant. I ordered the (much raved about) Veal Holstein, with qualis eggs, anchovies, truffled mash, capers and ‘secret sauce’ (£21.50) , and was bowled over by how comforting this hearty, mushy, juicy dish was. Overseen by Chef James Walker, whom I must tip my hat to, who lays on English classics, with a touch of Russian flair – Probably a reflection of the owners Leonid Shutov and Richard Howarth. A slither of Mark’s juicy Chicken Kiev was equally pleasing. Onglets supplied by the excellent Irish butcher in Knightsbridge, O’Sheas are also on the menu, served with frites.

Going back to service, I think I might prefer BBR to The Wolseley, the latter more epic in Grand Cafe terms, and the former a little more egalitarian, a little funkier, equally vintage in style, but utterly modern in execution. It’s just a great brasserie, diner, cafe, place to hang out, and the all-welcoming attitude is a breathe of fresh air. If you still haven’t been, I think BBR is worth a try. Not cheap however, we paid £68.91 for two plates of food plus two glasses of wine (more if you are partial to Vodka and Caviar), but it’s worth it. Glad to say that BBR is actually a place I would revisit, and I suspect I will in 2011, or maybe during Boxing day sales, if it is open, and if I still have some change.

The Gist.

Bob Bob Ricard
Anglo-Russian All Day Diner, Vodka & Caviar, 40pp
1 Upper James Street, London, W1F 9DF
Tel: +44 (0)203 145 1000
Tube: Piccadilly Circus

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I write this shuffling in my seat, on a flight bound for Norwegian airspace, and it isn’t often that I dream about London and its murky skies, but here I am, fantasizing about the startlingly magnificent lunch I experienced last weekend at Yashin, the latest addition to the London sushi scene. My god, was it exciting. Great sushi, and oh my gosh, did it burn an excitable hole in my already stick thin wallet. We go West.

It’s been two months since my move from Kensington, a part of town rarely known for sushi, and when it comes to restaurants on High St Kensington, choices narrow considerably; It is largely between a spacious Wagamama or the prospect of a tepidly overpriced burrito from Wholefoods. But things are set to change. Yashin is the latest debutant in this year’s hugely impressive armada of ‘serious’ restaurant openings. The concept is that of a upmarket sushi bar with all the accompanying glitz and pretension (and chill out background noise). Think of it, as Nobu alumni, ripping out the sushi bar with their escape from the mother restaurant, and the result is a sushi bar that is dedicated on forming the best by hand. Cooked dishes are kept to its bare minimum. If the small scale operation sounds familiar, it should as we’ve been dazzled before with the hugely romantic sushi bar run by a husband & wife team, otherwise bookmarked by yours truly as Sushi of Shiori (also of alumni from an equally starred Japanese restaurant).

Its respective owners boast pedigree and sushi credentials, namely Yasuhiro Mineno was Executive Chef at Ubon (of Nobu Group) in Canary Wharf for 7 years (which has shut, but was never really that good anyway) and Shinya Ikeda, who spent 5 years as a senior Chef at Yumi (which if I’m honest, I’ve never heard of).

You might ask if all this fluff which I’m making you read is at all relevant. But then you already know that I only do this when I think a restaurant is flippin’ fabulous. The writings (quite literally) on the wall suggest a radical experience – without soy sauce – of the idealistic intent of creating fanciful nigiri that merges the elegance of this stick and dip delicacy with a contemporary infusion of ‘fine dining’ elements in an effort to enhance the umami qualities so as to warp the senses. While soy sauce is not initially available to dip the sushi, it is only because the chef has worked elements of flavour directly on to the nigiri. Hyperbolic psycho-babble, you say? I blame the Norwegian time zone. Bear with me, the photographs are colourful.

The Yashin sake taster, two 50ml vials, £8.

We start with Dewazakura Muroko Namagensyu – a Junmai ginjo which has fantastic body and a hugely vivacious, biting flavour to it. It was as fragrant as a Sakura on a crisp September morning. It could not be matched with the underpowered and rather mellow Tedorigawa Gobyakumangoku – a Daiginjo. For eight quid, it was great fun (and perhaps good perceived value), with no expense spared in the visuals department. If a little impractical, as lifting the vials from the glass of dyed water became a bit of a nuisance what with the water dripping all over me.

“The Omakase”

You’ll notice I’ve not spoken about the menu as yet, but that’s only because you needn’t bother with choice. The highlight of Yashin, is their omakase, or the Chef’s menu, which allows the chef to channel his fine talent. Like Shiori, it is available by price points, starting at £30 for 8 pieces of nigiri plus a roll; £45 for 11 piece ensemble plus a roll and finally the complete waterworks and the kitchen sink, eponymously titled, ‘The Yashin’. 15 pieces of – and I quote – exquisite sushi, painstakingly crafted for you, in front of your eyes, by the chef-owners.

But first, we started with a bevy of freebies to grease the tract.

Miso soup, in a tea cup?

Note the careful attention to detail and branding. The chopsticks are not the snap it off disposable kind; these feel sturdy and wooden, about as as unbearably unbreakable as an on-key Wagner. Mmm… a comforting start.

Next, a salad spiked with a citrus-like dressing and garlic chips.

Crunchy, fresh – but a mere distraction…. where’s my raw fish dammit!

Here in London, we lack the likes of dedicated sushi bars such as Urusawa in LA (see Foodsnob and GT), where part of the charm – integral to the sushi experience – is the opportunity to watch the experienced Itamae personally putting together your plate of food. I have always seen this visual aspect of observing flair in action as part of the relatively high cost of sushi. Otherwise, if its just quality fish you’re after, any of the Atari-yas would do for a quick fix. Like a chef’s table at a GRH outlet, you pay the premium, but you also get to watch the head honcho ply their trade, first hand.

As you can imagine, this can turn out to be a rather mesmerising show and tell, especially with the diner being so close to the action. Here’s the first of my Yashin sushi platters being finished by the Itamae.

Feast with your eyes on Plate Uno.

Isn’t it just pretty? In addition to blow-torching (not all) , each nigiri was finished with something extra, either brushed with soy sauce, sprinklings of sea salt, and eye catching garnishing such as a radiantly crystalline orange ponzu jelly. I’ll be honest, I didn’t stop to take notes, when it landed, I led with my tongue.

Let’s get the obvious out of the way first – the rice was fluff heaven, a neutral to sweet tickle on the palate, it was technically superb, warmish, cooler than body temperature, managing a sticky consistency enough to hold together, but soft enough to melt the moment you bite into it.

Fish on the whole was top of the line. If you are a frequent flyer with the Nobus, the Rokas (these are good) and Zuma (and to a certain extent Sake no Hana), then you’ll be more than impressed with the sheer quality of produce. Lively, oily, crisp and odourless. Though excellent sourcing alone is not Yashin’s major selling point. It’s the finesse by which the Itamae has chosen to garnish his creations. Dinings have their ponzu-truffle wagyu sushi, Shiori boasts a in-house made truffle paste with their scallop; At Yashin, there are flavours of flames, piercing sea salt, the smell of – dare I say – bonito flakes, pepper and spice and the twang of a wicked ponzu jelly. To sum it up, sushi at Yashin is vibrant and it is current. Of the lot, I enjoyed the ponzu spiked salmon, the flamed otoro and the peppery wagyu the most.

Plate two.

On the second plate, sweet scallop, torced razor clam and a fabulous fleshy botan prawn, also torched and rubbed with a foie gras paste that gave it alot of firepower in the flavour department.

This is just a superb showcase, a mastery of absolute elegance that epitomises contemporary sushi. Beautiful, sexy, distinctive, efficient, healthy (relatively), utterly delicious.

Salmon Lunch set, £12.50.

Oh and in case you wondered, we also tried the budget route with the salmon set, 5 pieces of the excellent salmon nigiri, a salmon roll, plus miso in a tea cup and garlic chipped salad. Yeah great value.

Shiso Sorbet, £4.90.

To finish, the shiso sorbet with a texture analogous to a kitchen sponge and a sweet touch of minty fragrance. A nice way to wipe the palate clean.

I paid £97.20 for lunch for 2… which is of course a considerable expense. Not the most filling lunch (we gorged a 16in take away pizza for dins), but my gosh, it was brilliant. I think there’s a small army of fans already amassing on twitter, especially Gourmet Traveller who pointed me to this direction! Amazingly fabulous. If you love sushi, this is something you must try. I suggest dinner rather than lunch, as they have an expanded menu – in addition to the omakase – that allows you to compliment the meal with garnished oysters, selection of sashimi, handmade tofu, rolls and assorted carpaccio. Early indications suggest the oysters, the tofu and the carparccio are also mind shattering.

Now then, the burning question: Which is better? Hmmm… I think considering the sheer brilliance of the final product, the glitzy atmosphere, the showmanship, I might have to say Yashin. But only by a hair. Sushi of Shiori still holds its own, and for one, the missus prefers the more mature venue. It is just more personal, its concept is more romantic and the omakase is much more varied, plus you get more bang for the buck. That’s my one reservation about Yashin, its pricing competes on the level of the glitterati of Japanese restaurants instead of independent sushi bars. In that regard, if people are going to be paying top dollar, I wonder if diners might just choose to stay with the stars. With Shiori, its decent pricing was always part of its appeal. Having said that, you do get what you pay for at Yashin, and the sushi really is something special.

For the moment, the crowds have not crashed the party as yet, so if you’re looking for a sushi fix this week, I urge you to book a table now. This will make it to one of my drool-all-over-it list before the year is over. I highly recommend it.

In the end, I am just glad that London now boasts two exceptional sushi bars which deliver unique sushi in their own special way. Both are more than a cut above the old school Izakaya-types. With Sushi Hiro well and truly absorbed into the Atari-ya bubble, I feel this year is the changing of the guard, London sushi has now come of age.

The Gist.

Yashin Sushi
Sushi, £70pp
1A Argyll Road, off High St Ken W8 7DB
Tel 02079381536
Underground : High Street Kensington

For more photos, have a look at my flickr set.

We love Sushi: Mr Foodie, The Skinny Bib and GT … for now.

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Hawksmoor has great PR, one of the early champions of blogs, it has since gone on to utilise and charm the medium with great success. Generally speaking, you guys – ie, people who read online food ramblings – love Hawksmoor. And I suppose, as a viable business, it has prompted Will & Huw to expand with this second restaurant; much more conveniently located in Covent Garden. Technically, My visit this week (45) is during opening week, but like many of the well informed food writing/blogging republic, they will have got a meat-powerup in October from the oversubscribed soft-launch (including yours truly), and no doubt, you’ll already have read about it elsewhere.

But wait..wait…I think I can add value, serious.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the Hawksmoors are not really steak restaurants, despite what my peers have already said, it’s a meat restaurant. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking the steaks, they jospergrill the shiz out of the steaks well enough, but I just feel that the kitchen are distracted by cooking other – better – items off the menu. Actually, it’s more than a meat restaurant, it’s an unadulterated celebration of protein in all edible formats. Just look at how the menu reads: Six oysters and sausages; Half a lobster; Grilled lamb chops; Bone Marrow; Tamworth belly ribs, and that’s just for starters.

With protein to start, and protein mains, you can opt for more protein on the side, in the form of fried eggs or bone marrow, with bone marrow sauce and beef dripping chips. If you are partial to green things, look away. Rarrghh..!

The (poorly) 850g Porterhouse, £51.

So they have a chalk board to track the availability of pre-prepared cuts throughout the night. We wanted a bone-in rib at 850g, but they only had 1kg cuts. They couldn’t do a bespoke cut for us. That’s just blasphemy! No visible dry aging room. Perhaps a meat locker of some kind..? As I said in my 2009 post, this is why I don’t do steak at Hawksmoor. Choice is poor.

Ginger Pig Longhorns are great, strong beefy flavours, not overly tender, when dry-aged, the stuff is brill, but it is not better than O’Sheas. Overpriced at £60/kg, even for restaurant mark-ups. For the sake of comparison, Goodman’s prized USDAs are £63/kg, and if memory serves, the O’sheas for roughly £45/kg. In my humble opinion, if you love GP, you’re better off getting the meat from the butcher (at Borough Market or Marylebone) for significantly less money, and then putting the rest toward a quality skillet.

I am used to being able to select cuts and breeds, and that’s why I think Goodman is the better steak restaurant. A typical Goodman meal can include a USDA, a Chilean Wagyu, an O’Shea and a Galloway. At Hawksmoor, it’s Longhorns or nothing.

As for cooking: Yes, on the money. No drippage, so I assume it was rested enough (We waited about 20 minutes for this), it had the signature taste of charcoal, like a barbecue going off in your mouth, and I’m certain they have a Josper in the Seven Dials branch. A perfect medium rare. In terms of meat – beefy and a tad chewy, but tender. The tenderloin bit of the porterhous, however, was disappointingly chewy. In contrast, a tenderloin (on a porterhouse) from O’Sheas usually melts like chocolate.

..THE BAR MENU..

I can’t find the pdf version on Hawksmoor’s website, but I feel that this menu is an important one. It’s not cocktails and nuts, it’s a proper food menu that carries two significant Hawksmoor dishes, namely the lobster roll and the signature burgers (now with an expanded range).

Warm Lobster Roll with Bearnaise. £25.

For months now, Twitter chatter had suggested that the Hawksmoor owners did significant research by travelling to the home of the lobster roll – Maine, USA – in order to recreate an accurate rendition of this dish in their London restaurants. I have never had a proper lobster roll in America before, so this virgin experience is something I covet.

The inspiration for this particular roll comes from Red’s Eats , a small shack in Wiscasset, Maine, that has been around since the 30′s.

A warm, toasted soft bun with fine lashings of garlic & hazelnut butter, stuffed with an entire, whole, grilled Dorset Blue…

….oh fuck…fuck…!! First of all, visually impressive, really was stuffed with a whole lobster – I gather a 750g shell on crustacean. This was seafood heaven. Protein heaven. Heaven.

It was as if the lobster’s hard shell had been substituted with this dense, soft and richly buttery garlic roll. It’s not very big, so you can actually eat it with your hands… I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s just great lobster, well seasoned, great garlic butter flavours, great bun, floury and sweet. It’s £25 and it’s bloody expensive, but it’s worth every penny. I’ve never had lobster rolls before, as I said, and my first time was simply orgasmic. And I will be back for more. In fact, I’ve booked a table for the 1st week of December. I will be back.

The Hawksmoor Bugger, with Beef Dripping chips. £15.

Much hype has been created around this bastard, to the point where every time I see a blog post about the marrow-filled patty, I cannot help but roll my eyes.

But then I took a bite, and realised I was dead wrong. This is the best burger in town, gourmet or otherwise. Hype duly justified.

The sweet bun is just great, the ogle shield cheese, like a sweet cheddar is great, the use of pickles is illuminating. The patty is beautiful, juicy, beefy and it gives this impression like it has been steamed. We can’t help but feel like alot of thought has gone into this burger. Put all the elements together, and you have a burger that jives like an 18-piece band. A burger that potentially could (have) launched a thousand foodblogs.

The Kimchi Burger, £15.

I had high hopes for this, but sadly, I hated this. Messy. All over the place. At its core, it is similar to the house burger, but the cheese has been upped to some sort of blue cheese, I gather, to match the spicy kimchi, which was more soya-like than spicy. The cheese was overpowering and too sharp, the kimchi in burger was just weird. I felt it was the fibrous texture that turned me off it, it just refused to play nice with the patty. And what a shame really, because the patty is great, it needs to be the star, and need not play second fiddle in this weird fusion monstrosity. I scraped off all the wet kimchi, and continued chomping.

Experimentation that has gone awry. I think the Hawksmoor burger is perfect, tinkering with the design has led to something quite grotesque, and ‘comparing’ them head to head, it only made it even clearer as to how great the original burger really is.

Full disclosure then, the reason I visited for opening week instead of during the soft launch, was because the kitchen had flooded and hence the restaurant was closed during the day we were meant to visit. But Will was kind enough to extend the 50% discount for food to us for this anyway. So we paid £80.44 for a table of 3. At full whack, it would have set us back £136.94… which would haved worked out to be £45 each.

Hawksmoor is expensive, but you get a great meat-filled experience. Over the next few weeks, you’re going to read alot about the new Hawksmoor, if you haven’t already. The message I want to convey is to not have steak at Hawksmoor. Its good, but it’s not great, for the same money, I feel that you get a lot more at Goodman or even Maze Grill. Great steak restaurants are as much about the Josper as it is about the quality and choice of meat.

Instead, I urge you to go for everything else on the menu, the ribs, the lobster roll, the burger, the bone marrow, the lamb chops, the beef drip chips (which were jaw dropping) and the cocktails (I had a Johnny from London?), and it is exactly everything else that makes the Hawksmoor dining experience, such a satisfying one.

For reference:
My little guide to steak
Hawksmoor Commercial Road 2009 review
Goodman City 2010 review

The Gist.

Hawksmoor Seven Dials
British, £45pp
*Not really in Seven Dials*
11 Langley St. WC2H 9JG
Tel: 020 7856 2154
Underground : Covent Garden

Do Meat: Guy Dimond & Gourmet Traveller

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