Review: Kebab Queen, Soho

I bloody loved my dinner at Kebab Queen. Couldn’t stop smiling all the way through it. I defy anyone with an ounce of fun in them to have a bad time here. But on a serious note, there’s genuinely great cooking going on too.

So how do I review the experience without spoiling the surprise and giving away all the fun stuff that the staff are gonna enjoy explaining to you when you get there? Maybe just trust me. And let me at least tell you ’bout the food…

First course was a beautifully flame-kissed piece of foie gras, messed up with blobs of sticky date puree, fat raisins soaked in grand marnier, potato slow-cooked in duck fat until it was smooth as silk, and all wrapped in a buttermilk flatbread. Sick, sick, sick.

Cured mackerel was the delicate soul of the evening, very gently cured, paired up with neat disk of fried egg white and a harissa egg yolk, and a vividly green dill sauce.

Monkfish next. More filth. Seared pieces of tail, with crispy chicken skin, a soul-destroying sauce of chicken and monkfish bones, spicy cauliflower and a vein of chilli running through it. Wrapped in scorched disks of cabbage leaf.

Spit-roast duck next. Saffron and pomegranate sauce. Very, very saffron. Walnut praline puree. And on the side a lil’ caramelised donut filled with duck liver. Mmmmmmmmm.

But then the hogget. Just a brilliant piece of meat, rammed with flavour, seared and sweetly pink inside. Also done as a juicy and spicy adana kebab. Red pepper sauce with a vinegary iskander oil, a thick blob of yogurt, and a huge crinkly lettuce leaf swabbed with caramel vinaigrette to wrap with. You can see what they’re doing, yeah? It’s a kebab, innit.

It also came with a second serving of what was basically a bacon and ketchup roll, but the bacon was hogget. O. M. G.

The pumpkin in shredded filo pastry with chocolate orange sauce and lemon thyme goop was a satifying ending, notable for the pink peppercorn sugar sprinkled on top. I am going to make lots of pink peppercorn sugar, starting now.

My point being: that is a bloody LOVELY set of dishes, all brilliantly executed. The fact that the whole experience is huge fun because they (DELETED) and you get to (DELETED) and there’s no (DELETED) just doubles-down on the joy! The staff look after you like princes and the wines we had by the glass were all top notch. Tasting menu £65? GO! GO! GO!