Review: The Barbary, Covent Garden

The Barbary bar

The Barbary bar

Towards the end of our lunch at The Barbary I was trying to work out whether the likely £90 bill was going to be worth it. We’d had some lovely food (more on that later) and a nice drop of plonk but the price was heading towards fine dining. Then on the bill I noticed a neat little notice at the bottom: “Service & VAT are included in all our prices.” Unsure, I checked with a waitress, but yes apparently their policy is to swallow a fair service charge into the prices of the food.

Now, as far as I’m aware this isn’t without its cost: an optional service charge is tax-free, whereas include it in the menu prices and 20% of it goes to HMRC. But nevertheless, as service charge is always 12.5% in London and I’d tip that myself if it wasn’t, this was actually… mm… bit of mental arithmatic… an £81 bill, at least compared with anywhere else. So that feels okay. And it feels like The Barbary are being quite brave, trying to step out and do their bit to change an outdated and divisive service industry tradition.

Chicken livers

Chicken livers

So, about the food. We gobble up a beautiful Jerusalem bagel, covered in sesame seeds and both elastic and soft at the same time. With it we order two plates of dip. The first has two generous dollops of harissa and zhug. Which turns out to be a bright green paste of coriander, parsley and mild chilli. The harissa is also mild, but with a really splendid warm flavour of dried chilli. Neat trick. The other dip is Ashkenazi chicken liver. It’s not the smooth pate you’d expect, but a bit more like steak tartare in texture and flippin’ delicious to eat.

Next up are a pair of Moroccan cigars; actually a white fish pepped up with some spicy marinade and then wrapped in a crispy filo case. Massively munchable finger food with the yogurt and zhug dip.

Fishy cigars

Fishy cigars

For mains we try salt cod and iberico pork. We’ve been watching the pork getting charred over the flames of the open grill, and sitting at the bar watching the kitchen at work is one of the fun bits of eating at The Barbary. Then again, spending much longer than an hour propped on one of these bar stools is one of the less fun bits. Probably not a restaurant for a long, lingering meal. Also perhaps less fun with 4 or more people as you will be sitting in a line.

I digress. The pork is splendid, nice charring and still pink and meltingly soft inside. But once again I’m caught thinking: skewer of very nice pork, pickled fennel garnish, swipe of minted yogurt… £17? The salt cod has been treated perfectly and eats like soft, flaky and slightly salty clouds. It comes with a chunk of roast aubergine that is silky and subtle perfection.

You can have a meal for about £40 each before drinks at The Barbary (although that’s really £36 if you want to compare with restaurants that add a service charge or leave you to tip!). Taken for its individual elements, that doesn’t really stack up. Taken for the whole experience, the buzz of the kitchen, the unfamiliarity of the names and flavours on the menu, I’m happy to recommend everyone take at least one visit to The Barbary.

Astounding salt cod

Astounding salt cod

Review: Lorne, Victoria

Lorne

Lorne

Have I reached the end? Should I stop blogging when I can’t think of any witty, amusing, interesting or tangential theme with which to start a review? Or do I have a duty, nay a calling, to provide the internet-reading public with short, punchy, considered reviews of some of the most delicious places to eat in the UK whether there is a sarcastic preamble or not?

Yeah, that.

So Lorne was good. It’s in Victoria, just five minutes amble from the station, and it’s got a sort of posh country kitchen vibe going on that makes me think of Petersham Nurseries. The food is attractive, balanced and tasty with clean and precise flavours. It’s very pleasing.

Pork belly and half a lettuce

Pork belly and half a lettuce

I start with veal sweetbread, with a nice crust of nutty buckwheat and a blob of burnt apple puree. Enjoyed it, though the little sticks of celery(-like?) stalk seemed worthy and unhelpful. Maureen’s crispy soft-shell crab was perfect with a sweet and tangy katsu-curry sauce, the blobs of avocado and sliced radish very much in keeping with the Lorne vibe.

Main for me was pork belly. Four cubes had a very good crisp crackling topping, although the belly itself wasn’t as yielding and unctuous as other recent specimens. They served it rather startlingly with half a lettuce. Yes. With tiny cubes of smoked eel hidden among the head of leaves. I call that torture. Forcing me to eat a whole head of lettuce just to make sure I don’t miss out on any smoked eel! There were some nice bits of sharp cheese and ham in amongst the leaves too.

Turbot with morels

Turbot with morels

Maureen’s turbot main was the star, as it should be. Beautifully cooked piece of cloud-white fish with a dollop of caviar and a wild garlic leaf on top. Served with white asparagus, slices of morel and a fantastically yellow vin jaune sauce. This was every bit as elegantly rich as you’d hope.

And they turned out some splendid puddings too. My brillat-savarin pannacotta was fairly epic, the delicate cheesy flavour making the wobbly white pud come over very savoury. Nice sharp apple sorbet and crispy candied walnuts went very nicely. Maureen had fun with a strawberry tart. And we all had fun with their epic list of red dessert wines, which go back to 1946! And brilliantly a glass of the 1961 Rivesaltes will only set you back £15. It’s not often you get to sample such ancient plonk and I was easily talked into a 1978 Maury for £12. Bliss.

So… some lovely cooking. About £42 each for 3 courses before drinks, and you definitely need to save some budget for that epic dessert wine list. I think my main course struggled to live up to its price tag, but looking (and tasting) around the table I reckon most of the other dishes did. Still, although I think Lorne is a good find I can’t bring myself to rave about it – I’m just not sure it quite hits the heights of the final bill.

Brillat savarin pannacotta

Brillat savarin pannacotta

Review: Kiln, Soho

Kiln be bijou

Kiln be bijou

Kiln is a narrow little joint, mostly bar. Places like this come and go in Soho all the time – queues out the door on year one, vanished three years later. I’ve no idea what the recipe for longevity is, but I like Kiln so I hope they find it.

Inspired loosely by northern Thailand and bits of Burma and Laos across the border (perhaps the term “Upper Mekong cuisine” could be coined?) there’s lots of shameless power in the flavours and a strong hit of chilli in almost everything. Be ye warned.

Fermented sausage

Fermented sausage

So, they’re mucking about. We have ox heart larb, but rather than a meat salad this is served hot in a gravy and without much more than a pinch of herbs. Then there’s a rabbit curry, with some of the flavour profile of a khao soi but with balancing sweet and citrus mostly left out in favour of bitter and sour. Two skewers of aged lamb are beautifully cooked and heavily dusted with roasted cumin. Could eat a few more of those. Best of the lot is an “Isaan style Tamworth sausage” which I believe means they’ve fermented the bugger. It’s an absolutely genius taste and texture, funky and chunky and porky and meltingly good.

We’re spice fiends, and I’m sure most people would find our home-cooking a bit OTT, so when I say we’d be in Kiln every day if it was around the corner then that’s not a recommendation for you all. But £25 each will probably be enough for a good meal without drinks, which is decent value for inventive and relentless Upper Mekong cooking with style.

Ox heart larb

Ox heart larb

Review: Padella, London Bridge

Padella, simple and abuzz

Padella, simple and abuzz

Padella is hot right now. So hot that when we arrived at 6pm last week looking for a table, the next available was 9:30pm! Determined souls that we are, this time we (or rather Maureen!) got there by 5 and so managed to secure a table for 6:45. Was it worth it?

Well, yeah. This is absolutely top pasta, at really quite ludicrously good prices. We chuck down negronis at £5 a pop while waiting for antipasti. A fiver! Later I enjoy a good glass of dark Primitivo for a similar price. They kept the decor dead simple, black and white, stripped back. Staff are friendly enough but mainly super-super efficient. The vibe is definitely quick, casual eats.

Buratta excellente

Buratta excellente

Keeping it simple to start, with a bowl of lovely briny green olives and a burrata. This comes on a plate with a generous pour of golden and grassy olive oil, and a grind of pepper. It’s absolutely bloody perfect. Onto the pasta.

My lurid green plate of worms is nettle tagliarini. It comes with a warm, generous and gentle aroma of nutmeg, and a deeply amber egg yolk to stir into the verdant nest. The whole plate eats beautifully, and very easily. It’s a deceptively simple pleasure.

Maureen’s pappardelle is more excitement, with a fennel sausage and peppercorn ragu. This is really punchy and meaty, just balanced by the soft ribbons of perfect pasta.

We finish with a couple of slices of tart; one lemon, one almond with loquat, both lovely. The crazy thing about Padella is that this you couldn’t spend £20 on three courses even if you tried, and the drinks – including wine by the glass – are superb value too. No wonder the queues are epic.

Stunning pasta

Stunning pasta

Review: Smoke and Liquor, Rochester

Rochester's epic castle

Rochester’s epic castle

I love Rochester, it’s loaded with character and history, I just wish it attracted more hipsters. Purely for their tendency to cause delicious food and drink venues to appear, you understand. Although I can report that Rochester has at least one decent place for a bite.

I can’t help but think they might have named Smoke and Liquor better. I get it, smoke relates to the barbecue that drives a good bit of the menu. But… well, unless we’re now completely in the post-cigarette age, “smoke and liquor” just sounds a bit like a seedy dive bar.

Smoke n Liquor - no dive

Smoke n Liquor – no dive

It’s not, it’s lovely inside. They’ve looked after the interior of what is a bloody old building, maybe 17th century or sommat, but given it a modern hipster/barbecue vibe. The staff need more tattoos, but apart from that minor point it was great. We stopped for a lunch of small plates, so we didn’t really give the BBQ a proper try.

And the food was way better than I expected from Rochester. Slow cooked oxtail on cornbread worked well with a warm chilli heat. Goat cheese croquettes were really satisfyingly goatsome, with a blob of sriracha mayo on the side for warmth. Tempura asparagus with gin-cured salmon had a great combination of texture going on, with a thick slice of toothsome salmon, al dente

Asparagus and salmon

Asparagus and salmon

asparagus and the crunch of batter. Nice salsa verde as well, to give it some welly. Smoked haddock dashi. Interesting idea, and very pleasantly smoky haddock. The dashi was gently flavoursome, with herbs and bamboo shoot, and fragments of samphire. The samphire was brilliant – like a salty little POP whenever you got a bit in your mouthful of soothing broth.

Maybe £20 each would make a good meal out of small plates, before drinks, and that’s perfectly good value for the quality. They’ve got a ridiculous number of gins available, along with a wide collection of other booze. I wouldn’t expect great things from the wine list, but the beer selection is solidly crafty. Nice one, Rochester.

Ox cheek small plate

Ox cheek small plate