Review: Fallow, Soho

Chilly at Fallow

Chilly at Fallow

Comfort is a big part of how you rate a meal, whether you care to admit it or not. I remember getting to WTLGI down slippery frozen steps on a snowy night, teeth chattering, and then finding that it was never quite warm enough in the dining room to thaw out properly. I’m willing to bet that contributed to our unwillingness to engage with their cutting-edge concept menu. If you’re not comfortable, you tend to crave comforting food. It’s an extreme example but anything can colour your enjoyment of a meal. Perched on a hard stool elbow-to-elbow with other diners feels quite alright to suck down a bowl of ramen, but when asked to enjoy beautifully presented small plates that will set you back upwards of £40 per person it’s a bit jarring.

Celeriac and hen of the woods

Celeriac and hen of the woods

So I should declare that we were sat outside at Fallow, so we could dine with friends in Tier 2, and that it was below 5 degrees. The flame tower heater helped a bit, so did the blankets, but I had still lost all feeling in my toes by main course. The food was still jolly good.

Corn ribs turned out very cleverly to be chunks of grilled sweetcorn quartered lengthways and dredged in sweet spices and lime, so you could gnaw on them like a rib and get lots of bits stuck between your teeth. A fallow scrumpet turns out to be a pig-head croquette, beautiful gooey fibres of meat inside and a gherkin perched upon it.

By contrast, my starter was half a cod’s head. I’m a sucker for a fish head. It’s fiendish fun trying to dig and fiddle all the bits of meat out, and you end up with a surprising lot of very lovely meat. They had drenched it in a sriracha butter that gave a friendly kick to the cod.

Burger

Burger

The Fallow burger is a good specimen, very flavourful beef cooked just to pink and a sweet but sturdy bun. Tim went with the venison, also excellent quality, nicely paired with a peppery sauce, but this delicate dish was one that felt a bit odd to eat while wrapped in a winter coat and blanket. My main was earthier and I thought really excellent. A very earthy spelt risotto, finely shredded celeriac, chunks of roasted hen-of-the-woods fungus, a poached pullet egg and crispy panko topping. Very umami and with every kind of texture. If I had one tiny “hmm” it was that the white of the pullet egg was still at the “white snot” stage of cooking.

Shout out to a really excellent pudding, perfect for the weather. A hot and caramely lemon curd fondant, topped with lots of curls of lemon peel and a quenelle of lemony cream on top. The sourdough ice cream with malted crumbs on top was also good but just t-t-t-t-too cold for the weather!

Now, you’re probably heading up to £50 for a 3-course meal (though if you went for burgers and snacks instead of starters it’s more sensible). I think for it’s great position just off Regent Street you might forgive a bit of a mark-up, and I’m veeeeery aware that we didn’t have the best match between comfort & ambiance and the food, but I’m still going to say it’s a tad steep. Got nothing to complain about the food though, it’s all top nosh.

Fish head in sriracha butter

Fish head in sriracha butter

Romesco sauce

This smokey red sauce is great with fish, with leeks (in Spain it is served with calcots but leeks are a much easier alternative) and almost certainly with chicken.

1 long red pepper
1 large tomato
1 tsp mixed sweet and hot smoked paprika
1 or 2 garlic cloves
20g hazelnuts
20g almonds, de-skinned
1 slice of old bread
30-40 ml sherry vinegar
40-50 ml extra virgin olive oil

Roast the pepper in the oven at 180c for 30 mins, then wrap in clingfilm to cool down before skinning and removing the seeds. Add the nuts and garlic to the roasting tin 10 mins before the end so they are roasted too. Skin the tomato by cutting a cross in one end and soaking for 1 min in boiling water.

Chop up the bread and fry in a little oil until browned, then set aside. In the same pan warm the paprika in a little more oil until it has just heated enough to fry, then throw in the chopped tomato for 30 seconds before turning off the heat.

Grind the garlic in a pestle with a pinch of salt. Add the nuts and grind to a fine grain. Add the tomato, bread, pepper and keep grinding to a paste. Add the oil as you go, then at the end stir in the vinegar and enough water to loosen the sauce to a nice consistency. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Review: Chishuru, Brixton (eat at home)

Ekuru and goat cheese

Ekuru and goat cheese

We’ve enjoyed a bunch of upmarket takeaways over the lockdowns this year. Naughty Piglets worked out a superb set of menus that were an absolute doddle to reheat and plate at home, we ordered from them at least three times. And to control our bias, I can report that we had a takeaway meal from a similarly well-regarded modern British place at the same kinda price point, and it was a bit disappointing and more of a faff to boot. Along the same lines, we’ve become complete Dastaan addicts through 2020 (like, 10+ takeaway meals) and just to confirm their absolute excellence we had a takeaway from an equally well-reviewed modern Indian place in Brixton and every dish was a solid bar below Dastaan.

So now we’ve also had a West African Feast from Chishuru, a new delight in Brixton. So what was it like? Basically, a wonderful intro to west African cuisine if I’m any judge.

Let’s cover off the prep first. Definitely more involved than Naughty Piglets. But the instructions were terrifically clear and worked beautifully for timing; no awkward “argh, how are we going to keep this warm?!?” or “nuts, we’re going to have to wait for this!” Still, be aware that you’re going to be doing some oven cooking and a fair bit of shallow frying.

Splendid flavours though! Oh, and a hefty bang of heat. When one of the relishes is a dollop of fermented scotch bonnet pepper goo, you know you’re in fire territory. This was superb with the ekuru; a cube of steamed bean cake made with watermelon seeds and such stuff, with a green seed pesto on top. The better starter was a goat cheese pastry, which came out of the oil light and crispy (a total surprise to me, as I expected to cock it up and end with something oily and chewy!).

Beef ayamase

Beef ayamase

The main course of beef ayamase was eye-wateringly good. Chunks of beef shoved in the oven for twenty minutes should not have come out so tender, there is some kind of magic going on in whatever the marinading process is! The spicy green pepper sauce the beef bathed in was fiery and splendid, with a completely different set of flavours and feeling to anything Asian. Also need to shout out the attasi rice, the beautiful red colour and gloriously earthy flavours are definitely making African my favourite style of rice (okay, to be fair, from only 3 tries!).

The chocolate cake was a teensy bit of a let down. The cake itself was very… cake-y. No sense of indulgence, the texture more bouncy than velvety. On the other hand, the chocolate sauce to pour on it was mmmmMMMMMmmm! New secret flavour pairing: chocolate and black cardamom are MONSTER. On the other-other hand, there was far too little chocolate sauce; a teaspoon each.

Pudding aside, this was a real feast from Chishuru. I definitely want to walk through the door once lockdown is over. There’s a bit more prep than I personally want from an eat-at-home meal (I’m laaaaaaaazy) but it’s very well organised. I’d say absolutely solid value at £55 for two.

Review: Jose, Bermondsey

Jose, tapas bar extraordinaire

Jose, tapas bar extraordinaire

Jose Pizzaro’s unadorned tapas bar in Bermondsey is just perfect. I mean, it really is trying hard to be a little slice of Spain in London, but that’s okay by me. The decor is right, the drink is right, the food is right.

I want you to be in the right frame of mind before you come here. This is a place for a bite to eat. Not a leisurely meal, a romantic date, a grand banquet or a gourmet outing. It’s a place for up to four folks to perch on chairs around a little table or at a bar for an hour or so, drinking some good plonk and devouring a few small plates of good food. Great food. All set?

Happy boquerones

Happy boquerones

Their tortilla is predictably spot-on. It’s still a bit gooey inside, but it’s not a modern cut-and-watch-it-ooze porn-shot tortilla. It’s just a tortilla, superb foil for a glass of cold fino. Pan con tomate. It’s just unbelievable how much joy and flavour there can be from some slightly blackened toast, olive oil, salt, garlic and fresh tomato. On this occasion the house croquetas are spinach and creamy goat cheese, bloody lovely. Octopus a la gallega is just perfect, al dente and not even remotely rubbery, picking up lots of great garlicky paprika flavours. Bean stew with black pudding is excellent too.

Most tapas are between £5 and £10 with a handful of specials a few quid more. £30 each before drinks ought to be a good lunch or supper. Didn’t have the creme catalan this time, but have done before – it’s great.

Pulpo a la gallega

Pulpo a la gallega

Review: Noble Rot, Holborn

Nice bit of eel

Nice bit of eel

This was supposed to be a review of Noble Rot’s new place in Soho. But someone booked the wrong branch. I can’t get huffy. It was our friends who booked, for a long overdue get together, but then COVID went all tier-2 on us and mixed meet-ups were suddenly outlawed. Our friends were lovely as ever and let us keep the table. At the wrong restaurant. Hmf. Okay, tiny bit huffy.

For the record: I’m joking. We’ve only been to Noble Rot in Lambs Conduit St for a glass of wine before, so it was a new place to eat anyway and worth a review. I can confirm the seats are uncomfortably basic, with the slightly raised wooden edge that puts your legs to sleep after an hour or so. Okay for a glass of wine, less so for three courses. The wine choices by the glass were great, as you’d hope.

Maureen started with a slip sole in smoky paprika butter. Lovely little fish, good grunt of flavour in the butter. My starter of smoked eel, boiled egg and celeriac remoulade couldn’t help being delicious; a slice of smoked eel makes everything delicious.

Slip sole

Slip sole

My main was the star of the evening. Beautifully roast pheasant, gamey and the breast was good and squidgy. Plentiful bread sauce for the perfect savoury accompaniment, super-scrunchy roast pots cooked in duck fat, and a dollop of quince jelly just to make the smile on my face even broader.

Maureen’s turbot was excellent too, cooked just translucent and served on a bed of 50/50 butter-to-potato mash, simple braised leek and a creamy white wine sauce. Totally classic and very good, though so insanely rich that her eyes began to bug out with that “this is going to kill me” look over the last mouthfuls. Pear and almond tart with a dollop of sturdy clotted cream was an excellent finisher.

You’re looking at £45 for three courses without drinks. And really that’s the only issue. The cooking at Noble Rot is excellent, it’s straight-forward classics done very well. I just struggle to quite square it into that price bracket.

Handsome turbot

Handsome turbot