Cabana

Brazili-average BBQ

Brixton - September 2015

Recently a new Latin American chain restaurant opened in Brixton, albeit without quite the same amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth that accompanied Wahaca's arrival last year. One thing that might have helped there is not opening on the site of a once-legendary local nightspot.

The Bon Marche building has its own interesting history, but tucked away behind TK Maxx in a terrible location for any random passing trade, it doesn't scream “great place to open a large restaurant” to me. But then I'm not the multi-millionaire owner of a “family” business with branches in the O2 & Westfield centres, so what do I know? I'm just here to eat the food and give my opinion on if it’s any good.

Which it occasionally is. Kind of.

The restaurant itself is bright and buzzy – the music is samba-tastic, the colours are bright, the furniture is beach-bar shabby chic. The overall effect comes off like a kind of Wahaca de Janerio. The service was friendly, if a touch slapdash (food delivered to wrong tables, requested extras taking an age to arrive). It was the soft launch, and the staff seemed a bit green (and yellow, natch) – I’ll assume they've dramatically improved since the opening proper…

Previously, to me, the terms ‘Brazilian’ and ‘barbeque’ have meant all-you-can-eat meat carved off skewers to the point of near bursting. Here the menu is a single, average-sized serving of meat, delivered to your table on a skewer. The marinated lamb is tender and packs a real punch. Our neighbouring table were delivered a solid lump of steak that looked immense – all dark and glistening on the outside, red and bloody on the inside. Not quite the medium they had ordered, but I thought it looked boss.

On the starter menu, the pulled pork sliders are highly recommended – the meat maybe a bit on the mushy side, but rammed with spicy goodness. The chicken croquettes fall apart a little easily, but the chilli mayo dip is banging.

We also ordered a full rack of ribs: a massive slab that falls off the bone easily, but appears to have been nowhere near a proper grill – there’s no crunchy caramelisation, or nary a hint of a smoke ring. And they’re a bit fatty. But the bbq sauce marinade is thick, sticky, sweet and piquant, so it’s an overall positive experience. However, you can get better ribs in at least three other Brixton restaurants. As the menu proudly states, these ribs featured at Ribstock 2012. They didn't win. Go figure.

While the meats are good, the sides are weak: bland, boring and under-seasoned.

Finally, our dessert of Nutella donuts was an unappetising, overly hot, greasy waste of calories. If  Mrs Eatings is leaving Nutella, then something is seriously up.

To sum up, there’s some decent stuff going on at Cabana (mainly grilled meat), but it’s really not an unqualified success. Less ‘Tudo Bem’, more ‘às vezes bom’.

Cabana
http://www.cabana-brasil.com
201 – 207 Ferndale Road
Brixton
London 
SW9 8BE

Bo & Bun

Proper Bo, I tell thee.

Seminyak, Bali, Indonesia - July 2015

Without wanting to brag (too much) we recently went to Bali. The 3kg weight gain suggests we ate pretty well, so it’s time for – an international post!

We stayed in Seminyak, where there is no shortage of great restaurants I could write about. More upmarket than neighbouring Kuta, it’s all designer boutiques, sunset cocktail bars and beautifully presented places to eat. Understandably, it was mostly of an Asian persuasion, with highlights including Conde Nast Traveller’s ‘hottest new global restaurant 2009’ Sarong (no longer new, but with stunning location, presentation and flavours), the colonial stylings of Café Bali, seafood restaurants as far as the eye could see on Jimbaran beach, and anything the brilliant staff at out villa churned out.

But the one place that deserves a write up, was the right on point ‘Asian Eatery’ Bo & Bun. A place so good we went four days in a row…

And the main reason we kept coming back was the life-affirming bulgogi fries. A flawless dish; like a high class Asian chilli fries, combining perfect fries, sour kimchi, crispy fried beef and what may be the greatest condiment in the history of the world: sriracha aioli. Every taste-note hit, and always gone in about 60 seconds, they’d be worth the trip back to Bali alone. Best fries we've ever eaten, hands down.

Elsewhere, the food was nearly as banging.

A bahn mi filled with the naughtiest 18-hour pork belly that was tender fatty delight, and which was apparently better than anything one of our party had eaten in Vietnam. And presented with a mini frier basket of crispy wonton skins that were like a quaver’s badass cousin.

While the buns of the bao gao weren’t the lightest ever, the pork was so packed full of flavour – you could taste that it had just come off the grill. Less sauce and marinade than your standard London bao – here the meat was the star.

I would also recommend trying “The 12 Hour” Pho – cooking a broth that long is only going to load it with flavour, and it’s as clear as day. Piled high with fresh salad for crunch, it’s a real delight.

Add in a great drinks menu with the freshest of fresh mint cooler & Vietnamese iced coffees, and this place would be a smash hit in any city Mr.Eatings can think of. Loved it.

Bravo, Bo & Bun. Bravo. Shame it's so bloody far away.

Bo & Bun
http://www.eatcompany.co/boandbun/
Jl. Raya Basangkasa No.26, 
Kuta, 
Kabupaten Badung, 
Bali 80361, 

Indonesia

The Manor

Mind Yo' Manors

Clapham - March 2015

Almost* a year ago, we headed to The Dairy in Clapham for a meal that would become our first restaurant post. The general consensus of that trip could be summed up thusly; that was banging, yo.

Towards the end of 2014, at the other end of Clapham High Street, the team behind The Dairy opened up The Manor and it exploded like a 90s action movie… So clearly we needed to go see how it compared to one of my favourite London restaurants.

There’s a lot similar to The Dairy here; relaxed yet professional service, interesting stoneware plates, and a modern British menu focused on small(ish) plates of seasonal produce.

And the high standard of the food is similar too. There are magic moments of tastiness here.

A tangy fermented potato flatbread compliments the smooth freshness of a smoked aubergine & mint dip that is like a missing link between baba ganoush and tzatziki, and something I didn't know I'd been missing all my life.

Thick, fatty, chicken skins, more like pork scratchings, come accompanied by a snappy bbq sauce, and some fizzy kimchi.

The ox cheek (above hidden under veg) is a treat of tender, sticky, fatty meat that falls apart more easily than England’s batting order**, in a rich gravy that demands to be cleaned off the plate. So we do. With extra bread the gf has acquired to mop it all. Served with crunchy pickled squashes, to even out the richness.

Our dessert above is also strong. Dark chocolate and chilli mousse, brown butter ice cream to temper the heat, an orange sharp hit then more chocolate in a silky, rich ganache. It’s not Terry's, it's mine, and it's quickly gone.

But this is the thing I can’t get away from, it’s not as good as the meal we had at The Dairy. Perhaps unfair but each mouthful is judged by those elevated standards. Everything we had that evening was incredible, whereas here a lot of it is just good. Which totally qualifies for First World Problems. But it does take the shine off.

A bouche-amusing smear of butter on a rock with still-warm sourdough is a good way to kick things off,  but it’s not as satisfying as the bone-marrow offering from down the road.

The kale and cavolo nero dish is all a little one-note and looks as if someone had sneezed on the plate before handing it to us. The hay smoked pigeon is mixed bag, dry breast but tasty leg.

To seafood, and as light and delicious as the crab is, nothing sings in this dish. The charred celeraic is cold and limp, whilst the buttermilk foam is too sweet for my tastes.

And one more thing – they're nuts about nuts. Scattered. From a height. On every dish. Nut allergies beware. I understand a desire to add texture to dishes but not in everything. Hazelnuts don't add anything to the crab and I’d have enjoyed the dishes as much, if not more, without them.

If that sounds overly negative, it shouldn't take away from the fact we enjoyed the Manor. The quality of cooking, the blood orange cocktail, all a sound addition to the Cl'am area. I’d recommend it. But I'd only go back if I couldn't get a table at The Dairy first…

Oh and one final thing: beetroot chantilly cream petit fours? No.

The Manor
http://www.themanorclapham.co.uk/
148 Clapham Manor St
London
SW4 6BX

*give or take a few months...
**written before the 2015 Ashes

I Should Be Souvlaki

Greece is the word

Nunhead - May 2015

I Should Be Souvlaki might have the best street food name in the northern hemisphere (no-one is ever going to top Perth's Toastface Grillah). As a frequent visitor to Greece on family holidays as a much smaller (ea)Tings, a greek street food seller rocking up in my favourite South East London boozer for a pub residence meant investigation was required.

For those that don’t know, souvlaki is essentially the Greek version of a shish kebab; meat grilled on a skewer (souvla) and then served up in a pitta, usually with tomatoes, onions and my favourite Greek offering ever, tzatziki. Seriously, I bloody love it – what’s not to like about creamy yoghurt packed with fresh mint and cucumber and a big garlicky hit? When I was a kid with those usual childish suspicions of any food that wasn't sausages, I used to live off tzatziki and pitta bread when on holiday. To this day I can eat tzatziki by the pot-full, and have been known (somewhat heretically perhaps) to put it in bacon sandwiches. Allow democracy & medicine, this is Greece’s greatest gift to the world.

Back on point – souvlaki. Hugely popular in Greece, it’s somewhat overshadowed here by the Turks and their kebabs. I've had amazing souvlaki in Athens (Thanasis in Monastiraki being the prime example), that isn't readily available over here. But with branding as on point as I Should Be Souvlaki, perhaps this can change.

But how good is the food? 

Well, I'll get the one disappointment out of the way – I can't rate the tzatziki. Not enough garlic for my tastes: it needs more oomph. There is a decent twist of pepper adding some warmth. But more garlic, please.

Everything else is pretty damn decent. Best are the courgette fries; seasoned with a crunchy, semolina-like coating. They're slightly flaccid, but then a courgette is watery, so unless you're putting on more batter than vegetable (a la MEATliquor's deep fried pickles), it’s going to be a tricky ask to make them properly crispy. They’re so moreish we packed in a second portion.

The bifteki instantly tasted like holidays. The meat is well seasoned, with a hit of oregano through the meat that evokes every Greek grill ever. It's cooked well done in an age of pink patties, so is dry in places. But this is eased by the feta stuffing as well as the accompanying ‘Greek slaw’; sharp with vinegar, fragrant with mint and oregano. Fresh, light and crisp. Even the gf, who is usually pretty underwhelmed by sides of slaw, rated it.

So to the main attraction; we opt for the chicken Souvlaki.  The pitta is excellent – souvlaki pitta is closer to the classic flat-bread concept; thicker, fluffier and spongier than standard pitta pockets. They hold together much better and do a bang up job of soaking up meat juices. The meat itself is tender and moist, marinated in lemon and seasoned. And they’ve thrown in chips for added carby goodness. All the constituent ingredients are great, but I've been corrupted by the Turkish and feel it lacks something. Maybe extra heat from the missing garlic, perhaps a pickled chilli? It’s tasty, it's well made, but it could do with a little to lift it. It's still the best souvlaki I've had outside of Athens. OK, I've not had much souvlaki outside Athens, but the fact it bears comparison means they're doing good work.

And that name is genius.

I Should Be Souvlaki

https://twitter.com/isbsouvlaki

Thursday & Friday @ The Old Nun's Head

15 Nunhead Green

SE15 3QQ

Southern Joes

Where did you come from, where did you go?

Kentish Town - April 2015

Hot on the heels of Foxlow's awesome test drive, we found ourselves on another culinary march, this time to Kentish Town to run the rule over Southern Joe’s new northern outpost.

Having not visited the Covent Garden branch, which generated serious social media & food blog heat for the quality of its fried chicken, we were excited to give this a go.

It’s a mixed bag. There are some good things happening here, some disappointing.

The starters are a prime example of this. Jalapeno poppers come covered in the lightest crispy batter, with peppers soft and juicy inside. If I had my way, there’d be heavier with cream cheese, but that’s nit-picking. They’re up there with the best I've tried.  But then the popcorn shrimp... Anemic. Soggy. Bland.  It's rescued slightly by a dipping salsa that appears to be solely made up of blended jalapenos, that at least provides some fiery fun.

The mains: the shortrib is cooked to tender perfection, the meat falling apart like a cheap watch; clean off the bone without resistance. But it’s a little dull and a little bland, their rub seemingly rubbed off. No smokiness, no bbq-ness, no char, just a hunk of slow-cooked meat on a wooden board. Which isn't a bad thing, but isn't all that interesting either. Especially when coupled with the blandest slaw ever tasted. Not a hint of any flavour beyond thick mayo.

But smother the shit out of it all in their sticky, smokey, homemade BBQ sauce and suddenly you have an interesting plate (board) of food. We welcomed the addition at both starters and mains. A shame then, that eager staff kept clearing the jars away, only to bring it back at our insistence.

The much vaunted fried chicken is decent. We opt for two pieces with waffles. Chicken has a crispy coating, well cooked and not at all greasy. The 24 hour tea-brining preparation does not deliver any additional flavour, but has kept the bird perfectly moist (that’s what she said). I like the strength of the bourbon in the maple syrup. Covering savoury in sweet is something I have mixed feelings about; but mix in a ton of booze and it's all gravy. Well, syrup. Let’s just try and forget anyone ever put pieces of watermelon near this main course. A wholly unnecessary slice of Americana they can keep.

Other areas for improvement would be more crunchy topping on the mac & cheese. It says a biscuit crumb on the menu, which turns out to be the meanest crumb of a crumb. 

And the chocolate peanut pie is slightly dry, baked just that touch too long so that the topping edges into bitter. The salted caramel drizzle is delicious though.

It can be unfair to judge soft launch service so I won’t, other than to say if the waiters match skill with their enthusiasm and friendliness, then they’ll do very well. Nothing was bad, it all just needs some polish and no doubt that will come with practice.

All in all; a bit above average, Joes.

300 Kentish Town Road
Kentish Town
London
NW5 2TG
http://joessouthernkitchen.co.uk/

Foxlow N16

In French she would be called 'la renarde', and be hunted with only her cunning to protect her

Stoke Newington - April 2015

Unless you've been living under a rock (and therefore also under constant threat of eviction for the redevelopment of said rock into some super-expensive pebbles to be sold to rich foreign types - POLITICS!), you should be vaguely au fait with the concept of Hawksmoor and their really rather excellent restaurants. Well, perhaps less restaurants, more temples devoted to the worship of the meat gods.

About 18 months ago, the team behind Hawksmoor branched out with Foxlow in Farringdon, a ‘neighbourhood restaurant’, featuring the stuff that makes Hawksmoor great; high quality meat, top notch cooking, & Shakey Pete's ginger brew – in a laid-back bistro setting.

Clearly the concept has been a success, as this week Foxlow Mk2 opened in uber-trendy Stoke Newington. And as fearless food bloggers, we felt it necessary to go check it out and report back. It's a tough job, but someone has to do it…

And in a hardly-ground-breaking development, the place is excellent. A cosy, if noisy (wooden floors & no soft furnishings) dining room with the faded-glory retro décor that permeates all the restaurants. There’s definitely nothing faded about the glory of the food, which is especially on point with the meatiest options.

For starters that means belly ribs. Oh the ribs. Hawksmoor's tamworth belly ribs are probably still top two in my long romance with the rib. A twist here on their classic sauce, now heavier with spice; a healthy dose of cumin giving it a slightly Indian hint whilst a chilli warmth builds on the taste-buds. The meat is moist, not overly fatty, and so tender. Not particularly charred and light on the smoke (although there is a small red smoke ring in evidence), but it’s the sauce that makes it a triumph.

Our other starter of squid is enjoyable; coated in crispy, golden, peppery batter. It looks beautiful on the plate. It’s just not ribs, so we can’t love it as much.

If we had a Foxlow locally and was a more frequent visitor, we might find it a lot easier to see past the utterly delicious Ginger Pig steaks on offer. But we don't (*cough* open one in South London *cough*), so we can't, and it’s deckle steak for mains. Cooked pink, well-seasoned and with a great char on the outside, it's a fine example of their work. Even the connective tissue running straight down the middle of it cannot dampen things.


But the best thing about the dish is the huge paper-weight of a bone on the side packed through with meltingly-soft marrow.

Less excellent was the Foxlow fried chicken. The meat was tasty, and juicy. However, it was also on the greasy side. Not Dr Nick’s Window-to-Weight-Gain greasy, but enough to be noticeable. Also, the batter did not adhere to the chicken and fell off as soon as the chicken was picked up, which was a tad annoying.

Seemingly stuffed, we still had our just desserts. A knock-out one-two punch of a chocolate salted caramel tart, and a passion fruit & soft-serve ’Eton mess’.

The tart was heavy with quality bitter dark chocolate. The caramel is strongly salted, but holds the balance well.  Added flakes of sea salt on top of the chocolate, and there are a couple of occasions when the flavour goes nuclear. And the Eton mess was a great end to our feast; fresh and tangy, it's an excellent palate cleanser that rounded things off so nicely, we even forgave the hard and possibly shop-bought nature of the meringue…

Great place, great food; they've done it again. Those aging hipsters in Stokey have never had it so good.

71-73 Church Street,
Stoke Newington
London 
N16 0AS
http://www.foxlow.co.uk/

#FryHard

Yippee-Fry-Aye.

Shoreditch - April 2015

Lent. Traditional time of penitence and abstinence, before we all hail the chocolate rabbit god laying eggs from whence the baby Jesus hatched  (I think I have that right). Basically, no badness is the general rule for many. Clearly Messhead (aka Chef Jim Tomlinson and Miss Cakehead) didn’t get the memo.

Last seen trying to recreate the taste of human flesh in a burger, this Easter holiday weekend they’ve been down at Boxpark in Shoreditch armed with a couple of deep-fat fryers and “a load of things you can just buy down the shops” (to quote the chef). The premise is simple: deep fry the shit out of stuff.

Abstemious this is not. Take that, Lent.

It’s hardly haute cuisine, but it takes a certain type of mad genius to think ‘what’s missing from a crème egg? Batter.’ And given they’d all sold out of those when we rocked down late on the first day, clearly the masses agree.

In fact, after a three & a half hour lunchtime rush, about half of the 100 options on the coronary-inducing menu were gone. No pancakes, no sausage rolls, no donuts (I totally love the idea of deep frying a deep-fried snack). 

But from the selection of what’s left, the best proved to be foodstuffs with a low melting point; cheese-strings and babybels become gooey treats and a rocky road is pure filth - now a squidgy warm cake filled with oozing melted mallow.

I don’t think frying improves a shop-bought scotch egg (but a fresh made one, with a warm runny yolk could be amazing). And in the case of jaffa cakes, the orange jelly melts away too much – leaving a mere disappointment of sticky orange essence.

It’s Willy Wonka meets Chip Shop. A fondue party in the age of austerity. And props to them for trying to answer a classic pub debate – what else would you, and what else could you deep-fry? Now, roll me to the cardiac ward.

Beer & Buns

I like big buns and I cannot lie...

Liverpool Street - 27 February 2015

Buns are big business. London’s premier steamed bun slingers, Yum Bun have a pop up in Harvey Nic’s (dahling), and their main rivals in delicousness, Bao, are about to open up in the heart of Soho. 2015 is the year Hirata hits the heights.

And joining them (on a temporary basis at least) are Beer & Buns, a six-month pop up near Liverpool Street that does exactly what it says on the tin. And a little bit more.

The location doesn’t immediately scream ‘exciting food pop up’. Above a sushi train in an outside-of-office-hours deadzone. But persist. Once you’re through the quiet & empty, up the blackboard painted stairs (with chalk for adding your own bun-based bon mots), you find yourself in perfectly on-trend Narnia of cool. The rock soundtrack speaks to my child of the nineties sensibilities, there’s table football & pinball, and more scope for wall-scribbling. And most importantly; beer and buns.

And wings.

The menu reads short and sweet; three types of buns (well four, but one was vegetarian), three flavours of wings.

The buns themselves are excellent – soft, fluffy, and pretty damn big; certainly the biggest buns I’ve eaten (that’s what she said). The star of the show is the signature bun; filled with chicken katsu and yuzu coleslaw. The chicken is moist and tender, the coating crunchy, the slaw creamy. It’s a winner.

The pork bun is nice enough, a thick slab of belly meat, but the pickled cabbage a touch bland and the whole thing lacks any punch – there’s allegedly some mustard mayo, but I didn’t notice it. The gf hit upon the perfect trick by dabbing her bun through the leftover sauce from the wings and said it was immediately improved. The duck is well cooked, but the supposed caramelised spring onions and advertised sauce add nothing to elevate it beyond good. In both, the base is there for something special - some bottles of Sriracha (or similar hot sauces) on the table would lift everything. 

And it’s worth reiterating that the chicken buns (with self-saucing slaw) are spot on.

The wings are great; deep fried, beautifully crisp and liberally coated in super-sticky sauce. And it’s satisfying to bite into a meaty, manly, whole wing, than the pitiful twiglets some places pass off as wings these days. This meat is tender and comes clean off the bone. The whole dish is three or four napkins messy. Yes, the 3 different sauces all taste similar; the sweet and spicy, and the Korean hot are virtually indistinguishable, but who cares, it’s delicious and filling.

The beer part stacks up well also, with an interesting selection of Japanese craft brews I’d never heard of. I’ve now added Hitachino Nest to my list of must-try again beers.

Beer & Buns is a tasty little find. Go there with a bunch of mates, get on the table football, grab some brews, smash through the chicken buns and wings, and you’ll have a banging night. BYO Sriracha.

Beer & Buns
'Upstairs @ K10'
3 Appold Street
London
EC2A 2AF

http://www.beerandbuns.co.uk/

Q Grill

Jump into the Q

Camden Town - December 2014

It may seem bizarre to say it now, but there was once a time - not all that long ago in the UK - when pork went un-pulled, ribs were almost exclusively spare, and smoking was something you did to your salmons.

Now you can barely budge for brisket and the place is practically dripping with BBQ sauce. If Marks & Spencer are selling pulled pork, it’s fair to say that BBQ is here to stay. And with this cross-over from fad to bona-fide culinary phenomenon, it’s gone upmarket.

My judgement of barbeque restaurants uses the Bodeans BBQ Benchmark – London’s stalwart original providing a solid balance between portion-size, price and flavour. But, a new breed of restaurant has sprung up, where the weight of the plate and the load on the wallet is more finely balanced. It’s within this more rarefied sphere that Q Grill operates; they’ve got a pop up in Selfridges and branded plates, so this clearly ain’t your standard smoked meat slinger…

It was to their original place in Camden that we headed this past twixmas in search of a meaty  antidote to all that turkey. Thankfully closer to Chalk Farm than Camden Town, the levels of rage Camden Lock invoke in me were avoided and I could rate my meal in a relaxed and balanced way.

All the staples were on show in the restaurant – bare wood, leather booths, rock n roll soundtrack, at least 3 beards. It’s a bit clichéd, but it works to create the relaxed vibe you want when chowing on barbequed meats, particularly when the room is as big as this one; there’s no sitting on top of one another as encountered at other places.

The food is of high quality too. They have a Josper grill that has been a signal flare of smoked excellence, in my mind, since trying the much-missed Ribstock 2012-winning ‘Roxas Racks’ from Redhook. And it’s put to good use in our first starter; a sac magique of juicy, fall-apart tender hen’s wings. Sticky, but sans sauce, the sweet meat is the star here with smoky flavours an able supporting act. And bonus points for serving them in a bag. As theatre goes, it’s hardly Hamlet, but it is fun and I’m easily amused.

Elsewhere we have a ceviche that is light and fresh, but lacks chilli kick and citrus zing that you get with the best, so it’s not hitting the heights of our experience at Lima Floral. But then we’re in a barbeque joint and not a Peruvian restaurant run by a Michelin-starred chef, so perhaps that’s an unfair comparison.  The plantain chips are a great crispy addition.

We went for a rib-fest for out mains; pork and shortrib. No visible smoke ring to the pork, but a nice crisp char to the outside which adds crunch to the tender meat. The quality and the flavour of the pork is the main event and shine through. Unfortunately the BBQ sauce that accompanies it is a huge disappointment – watery & insipid, it adds nothing.

The beef rib is impressive, to behold and to eat; meaty, glossy and deeply satisfying. It (note a singular rib – but a hefty one) does all the good stuff you want your shortrib to: fall apart at the merest touch, melt in the mouth, add an inch to the waistline. It comes swimming in an unctuous, glossy gravy, with sweet potato mash and roasted garlic. The whole dish is pretty bloody delicious.

So, where does Q-Grill sit in relation to the B-BBQ-B? Well, the meat and cooking is of a higher quality. This also means higher costs for smaller portions. For example, you’re looking at £18 for the beef – roughly the same price as an entire Bodeans platter. But with the standard of the dish, it doesn’t represent poor value. And here’s the kicker – if you sign up for their Casual Diner’s club, they’ll take £20 off your bill the first time you visit. Which made our tasty meatfest rather reasonable. Score.

 

Q Grill
29-33 Chalk Farm Road
London
NW1 8AJ
http://q-grill.co.uk/

Peckham Bazaar

Wanna know the rest? Hey, buy the rights...

Peckham Rye - December 2014

Getting to Bazaar feels like you’re going on a bit of an adventure. It’s not found in the usual Peckham hotspots like Rye Lane or Bellenden Road, and walking there seems like you’re heading into the middle of nowhere. But at the end of this unexpected journey, you’ll find something very special. 

We’d been dying to try the place for quite some time, after the food grapevine was a-buzz at the beginning of the year with talk of a small local place serving up incredible grilled meats on an outside grill. Unfortunately, a planned six week closure to move the grill inside stretched out to nearly six months, thanks to issue with extraction (some shit with a fan) and complaining neighbours. But it’s back. And it’s banging. 

Styling itself as a pan-Balkan grill, Bazaar was opened in answer to the lack of, in the owners’ opinion, any decent Greek / Turkish / Albanian food in London. That’s obviously a subjective point (I’ve had some great Greek & Turkish meals myself, and I suppose it’s been the classics), but if it has given rise to this place I’ll go with it. 

The food is all about up-to-date flavour combinations but without the faff of ‘modern’ techniques; you won’t find a waterbath within a mile of this place. Everything is grilled over an open charcoal pit at one end of the small room - which fills the restaurant with delicious smells and adds the occasional theatrical flame for good measure (incidentally, there have been Tr*pAdvisor reviews bemoaning the smoky restaurant. We experienced nothing of the sort, suggesting that extraction works well). 

Also, the menu is ever-changing, dependent on what can be sourced from the markets at any given time. So there’s every possibility you’d never be able to try the food we ate, which would be a real shame, because a couple of the dishes were incredible (the others all decent).

For starters we have marinated octopus, which is smoky, spicy, well seasoned and tasty. A shame then, that it’s also not nearly tender enough. Chewing it, let alone cutting it into mouth-sized portions, takes some serious elbow grease. But the flavours are enough to make up for a lack of tenderisation. 

The mackerel we had was delightful, firm flesh, crispy skin and packing some serious heat from the esme salad. 

The heat is carried through into the mains with an amazing dish of partridge breast and leg, which manages the alchemy of setting your mouth slightly ablaze with adjika, while retaining a depth of sweet flavours in the meat and the sauce. More smokiness from the moutabel (mashed aubergine) complimented everything. The flavour of spices kept building in the mouth long after the food had disappeared, and when the dish was eaten clean, both Mr. & Mrs. Eatings looked forlornly at the empty plate wishing there was more. 

Next to it, the lamb dish felt a little washed out. Beautifully blushed pink, tender and juicy, with a fragrant sauce and creamy beans, it was a very tasty dish, but it really didn’t stand up to the powerful punchiness of the partridge. 

For desserts we had a cheese board, and to be honest, there’s a reason you don’t hear much about Balkan cheese. It’s always interesting to try alternative cheeses, but there was no trees being pulled up by this selection of pretty samey hard cheeses.

The baklava however, was a bigger success. Mr. Eatings is no fan of it, but the raptures my fellow diners were in, suggests it was a fine effort. Sweet and sticky, with a light rosewater hints, poached fruit and ice-cream to cut the richness. 

They're on to a winner here. The general consensus from the group was that the meal was delicious. There’s nothing bizarre about that. 

Peckham Bazaar
119 Consort Road,
London SE15 3RU

http://peckhambazaar.com/