Review: Crispin, Clapham

We moved to Clapham five years ago, and the only small independent restaurant that critics and bloggers were ever bothered with – the Dairy – immediately closed. Roll on five years, and we’ve now got Crispin at Studio Voltaire, the third or fourth outpost of this lil’ bunch of small plate places. Let’s hope they stick around! Not to do Clapham Old Town down: we’ve got a couple of great dining pubs and Michelin-starred Trinity, along with some solid mid-range options.

Crispin have transformed the blank atrium of the Voltaire art gallery/studio into a cosy dining space, although it still has a strangely pop-up vibe to it. Maybe inevitable in this spot. Still, sat at the bar we’re comfy and well looked after. The menu is nibbles, small plates and larger plates.

We nibble two Montgomery cheddar croquettes with a dab of brown sauce, they’re good and gooey. Two small plates are deep-fried pheasant and stracciatelli. The pheasant is a leg, bashed flat and breadcrumbed, with the talons still attached to show that it was definitely a real pheasant. It’s a dirty treat with the glob of n’duja mayo alongside, though there’s not much punch to the n’duja. The stracciatella is probably dish of the day, lovely gooey cheese, brightly creamy, served with wide ribbons of raw squash lightly pickled and gnarly dribbles of fermented chilli sauce. It was gagging for a bit of bread or cracker.

The large plate we shared was a chicken parmigiani, ringed with a squiggle of soft ricotta and lavished with a pouring of hot honey on top of the tomato sauce. The mixture was a filthy success, which I suppose is why hot honey has been trending this last couple of years. Your basic dietician can tell you that everything tastes better if sweetened. Try this at home: slice a tomato and then sprinkle sugar instead of salt on it. Thank me (or rather, Maureen) later. Anyway, this dish balanced it quite well, with the ricotta to cut the honey sweetness. It did become a bit rich eventually and the chicken breast beneath was sturdy and dense. I guess it always is, but I live in hope! Oh: we also ordered chips, and these were truly excellent with loads of good mayo.

The wine list looks good and we picked out a couple of decent glasses, though my orange was more interesting than Maureen’s red. You’ll pay £40 each for food before drinks for a full meal, which I would say is a little toppy for this level of cooking. But I’m glad to have somewhere close to home whose ambitions fly higher than avo on toast!