Review: Behind, Hackney

Back from a six week trip to Patagonia and I was looking forward to some fine dining! It’s not that you can’t find any good food in Chile… it’s just really hard, especially as we were (deliberately!) exploring the back of beyond. Some of the best bits were straight from the sea: if you’re ever in Chilean Patagonia look out for “puye”, a dish of tiny fish fry very similar to baby eels in a garlicky pil-pil dressing.

Behind in Hackney is also a seafood menu, very much more classy but also packed with big flavours. The dining room is only about 20 covers, a modern setting dominated by a curvaceous blond wooden counter. All the chefs share all the front of house duties, which makes for an informal and friendly atmosphere. They’re super-helpful and love talking about the food and the wine list.

We began with two accomplished bites of mackerel, a tartare and a tiny but perfectly charred slice of fillet. The next dish was a knock-out. Half a beautiful red prawn, uncooked but with the head meat made into a simple but powerfully pungent sauce with some Riesling. Served with a small cup of clean and warming prawn broth and a lovely springy little prawn bun, this was really single-minded excellence.

They followed it with a more complex bundle of flavour; a piece of trout long-preserved to build density and umami, wrapped in nori, with a parsley and turnip sauce, a big oyster leaf full of oceanic flavour and all doused in a beurre-blanc made super-salty-smoky through the inclusion of strong kipper and trout roe in the sauce.

Another very clever combination was built around monkfish cheek with celeriac, pear and mint, the overall flavour being beautifully fragrant on the sturdy white meat. Then a very easy to love dish of pumpkin and crab tortellini with candied pumpkin seeds and a crab bisque absolutely humungously full of flavour. The final fish course, a piece of plaice, was quite restful after this rollercoaster of flavours.

Desserts were neat and delicious. A cleansing shot of rhubarb with apple foam, a fragrant herb sorbet with a dollop of lemony meringue on the side, a lovely swig of lassi absolutely humming with cardamom, and then a dark chocolate concoction shot through with black olive to cut the richness.

This menu was 100% aligned with my food preferences: big flavours, unexpected combinations, lots of umami. Everything was delicious, I don’t remember a bum note anywhere. At £98 each before drinks this is totally worth a special trip if you like some of the same things as me.