Lunch at the Pesant

I am lucky enough to work in the middle of a brilliant London food triangle. With Islington just to the north of me, Exmouth Market around the corner, and Farringdon just to the south, I'm spoiled for choice. I'm slowly working my way through the options. Lucky for me, then, that for a recent work lunch we all went to The Peasant on St John St, one of the respected restaurants/gastro-pubs in the area.

The downstairs is a more informal pub and eating space, while the upstairs is the restaurant, with big windows and linens and waiter server. We ate upstairs and for our lunch we had the same menu as would be served for dinner. Prices reflected this; I went for the venison with girolles mushrooms, mache and taratur at £16.50. The mache and taratur weren't familiar words to be, but I was lured by the venison. Nearly every dish, in fact, had ingredients that were unknown to most people.

The venison was incredibly tender and cooked perfectly, and it turns out the mache was just lamb's lettuce while the taratur was humus minus the chickpeas. It was all nicely presented as well, but overall the experience was a bit fussier than I like to enjoy. Most dishes had one or two (or more) ingredients that could have been left out without doing injury to the taste, and the service was a bit more formal than the space warranted, especially considering we were the only ones eating there. For example, a member of the group wanted chips with the meal (they have the best french fries this side of France) but he was told it wasn't possible since that was only served downstairs. Perhaps the answer for next time, then, will be to eat downstairs in an atmosphere I enjoy more.

London’s Best…Beefy Sunday Lunch

If you’re going to be a carnivore, I reckon you best do it right. Don’t shy away from the offal, don’t feel guilty for eating something just because it was cute when it was still going about on its legs, and make sure it’s tasty meat that’s been well treated (both before and after the slaughter). I’m a real meat-lover and consider a piece of well-aged beef a glorious thing, the culinary equivalent of sunsets in the Tuscan hills or staring out across placid blue fjords. Which is why I find having the Sunday lunch at the Marquess Tavern such a treat. All their meat is UK-reared and free range, and though you won’t find this the cheapest gastro-meal you’ve had, you are paying for quality. The star in my eyes is the forerib of beef, served hanging off the bone and begging to be lifted up and eaten as if you were Henry VII.

You select your forerib based on the weight; as weights get ordered they go out of stock so you’re advised to a) book a table (essential) and b) book early. The staff is helpful in guiding what weight would be good for your group size and hunger volumes. The last time I went, 5 of us dined on the beef and we had the biggest rib available, costing about £85. Not cheap, but when you pile on the Yorkshire pudding, vegetable, potatoes and gravy – all included in the price – things start to level off again. The bigger your piece the longer your wait for it to be cooked, but there’s proper beer on hand to give you something with which to occupy yourself. At the end of your dining, there is a bone to take home or feed to the neighbourhood dog (I take it home wrapped in acres of foil in order to make soup, much to Mr. A&N’s embarrassment and the neighbourhood dog’s ire) and a sense of well-rounded beefiness like no other.

A caveat worth mentioning is that the kitchen can get a bit harried during Sunday lunch, resulting in beef that goes beyond rare and Yorkshire puddings that go beyond golden. The tenderness and rich taste of the long-hung beef balanced this out and rescued it from being a disaster, but our group was disappointed that every slice of meat wasn’t bleeding onto the plate. A look around showed that a couple of other tables suffered the same problem, but that another 20 minutes later the kitchen was back on even footing. If you value your meat rare, you might want to be insistent on this point. For me, this isn’t a factor that would make me abandon the place (I’m due to eat there again in 2 weeks time) since even when the food’s imperfect it’s really very good. Plus, the experience of tucking into a proper Sunday lunch with a table full of friends, all indulging their carnivorous desires, is an ideal way to spend an afternoon.

The Eagle Gastro-pub

Owing to a minor gas leak from our new boiler (ah, what a sweet phrase to hear), rather than risk blowing ourselves up just to casually boil some gnocchi we decided to eat out this weekend. After looking at several possible contenders, we decided to eat at The Eagle, the restaurant for which the term ‘gastro-pub’ was coined. Mr A&N and I are big gastro-pub fans, so it’s a wonder we hadn’t been there before.

The Eagle is so true to it’s old-school, 1990’s roots that it doesn’t even have a web site. I think that qualifies as cutting-edge-retro these days. The interior is as you would expect from a gastro-pub, though this was the place that established the mould: old Victorian boozer, with a painted ceiling, exposed floorboards, and mis-matched chairs. The menu was a bit of surprise, though, with very reasonably priced mains (£9-£11 for the bulk of dishes, one or two at £14) and ingredient combinations that tended toward the Spanish.

The food was also a surprise, being not just good but very good indeed. One main we had was onglet of beef (or hanger beef), which was cooked properly so that it was flash friend but still rare. Surprisingly, it was served with tarragon but it was a pleasant surprise rather than a curious taste sensation – the tarragon tasted very aniseed-y but the beef more than held its own, letting each mouthful be strong in flavour. The haddock main, served with an anchovy paste, sultanas, and almonds, served over garlicky spinach, was really outstanding. I’d never had haddock that managed to be that meaty before, and the spinach was a fresh, nutty variety that helped to bring something more to the almond slivers floating about. The only complaint was that the dish was awash in olive oil; very good oil it was, but I do think they could have held back a bit – olive fields all over Spain must be feeling the pinch.

I still can’t believe we’ve taken so long to eat there, but it’s heartening to see that the restaurant that set the gastro-pub standard still has high cooking standards of its own. We forgot to bring any camera with us so rather than a picture of the food, you’ll have to settled for a picture of an Eagle of a different sort.

Archipelago

In a trip designed for the adventurous, I went with a group of people from Friday Cities to Archipelago, a restaurant that promises ‘the sensuous indulgence of tantalising global cuisine’. The innocent sounding ‘global cuisine’ belies the true nature of what’s on order: kangaroo, gnu, zebra and crocodile, locusts and scorpions and bumblebees – and of course, lentils and chicken. Surely, though, with this edible zoo of the weird on the menu, you’d be tempted to give in to your safari instincts and look beyond the chicken.

In our group of 13, all exotic items on the menu were accounted for. There were a few twinges of guilt, mostly over eating zebra; curiously, the kangaroo was the most popular main dish and didn’t elicit any feelings of regret. The bug salad was also popular to order, although less so when people were facing a lettuce/garlicky-locust mouthful. Chocolate covered scorpion (stinger removed) was an expensive pudding at £7.50, and despite the theatrical crunching noises it made when eaten, the taste was described as a mild ‘rice krispie flavor’.

The food on offer is clearly intended to be a talking point, but it’s not just a triumph of flash over substance. The cooking is genuinely good: my starter was an ordinary seafood and chili stir fry, cooled off with a cucumber tzatziki, and was very good at being what it was. The kangaroo was nicely laced with garlic and spices, with a creamy nutty dipping sauce and vegetables on the side. I did dip into the bug salad and emerged with a locust on my fork, which contained more shock value than anything really worth eating (and the flaked-off legs and abdomen there were resistant to being swallowed were, I admit, on this side of horrid). The dining experience comes at a price, with us paying £32/35 a head for 2/3 courses. But, with that money, you’re buying a meal that is both tasty and a showpiece.