A brilliant marketing wheeze – all possible fresh produce is sourced from the immediate environs of the capital – has already assured many column inches of coverage for this new restaurant in a former pub.
Thanks to the location, they do indeed need all the PR they can get. Even the most accomplished estate agent might have to concede that this corner site – opposite a massage parlour, ten minutes’ walk from King’s Cross – is ‘difficult’. The interior – cobalt blue, and swathed with festoons of chainmail – is certainly ‘different’, though, and pleasing too. It positively shimmered the sunny lunchtime I visited. Initial service impressions were also favourable.
As it turns out, the only thing wrong with this place is the food. Wandsworth-baked bread, brought immediately, was fine – white, chewy and, in a good way, very English. But who in their right mind would serve olive oil with bread like that? It made no sense. Neither, really, did Chesham goat’s cheese nettles pirogi, which tasted as unappetising as they looked; a few greasy breadcrumbs on top did not help. A Canvey Dover sole was plated up complete with head, skin and roe. The flesh had admittedly been grilled to perfection, but the accompanying spinach verged on inedible. A baked cheesecake was a great wodge of a thing, with a claggy base, and accompanied by an ungainly dollop of rhubarb jam. After this multiple assault, only a strong post-prandial filter coffee stopped me feeling slightly queasy.
So, as you’ll gather, I can’t really recommend this brave new venture, which is a shame. But chefs who build their PR on the metropolitan associations of their food need to ensure that it is not dished up in a style which verges on agricultural.
