Gilgamesh - Gilga-meah in Camden - Oct 2013

It's been a while since Gilgamesh opened. The 800 seat 'super restaurant' landed in pre-gentrified Camden Lock market in 2006 like a blinged-up supertanker gatecrashing a Levellers gig.

Visually, it's stunning. The diner-to-be ascends a narrow escalator, which opens out into an atrium space, a cavernous daylight-filled dome, stuffed with ornately carved dark woods and squadrons of hushed staff. It's definitely one of the more extravagant spaces in the city, as distinctive as the tall tower dining of the Shard and its ilk.

Sadly, it didn't take long to go downhill on a recent lunch visit. Paper towels, scuffed and peeling menus and cheap, unwrapped disposable chopsticks clash with the opulent surroundings. We were the first people in at 12.30 on a weekend lunchtime, and indeed the only diners for a while, so maybe they only bring out the good stuff (and staff) for the beautiful people later on in the evening.

It's a surprise that it's so quiet, given the vast hordes chowing down on hideously stodgy, reheated muck from the noodle merchants below. Despite the prices being more Chelsea that Camden, Gilgamesh have a set lunch menu at £12, so are not so far from competing in price and are surely a step above a styrofoam tray of MSG. I think there's more they could be doing to create a welcoming entrance - either that or they need to actively compete with the serried ranks loudly peddling their deep-fried chicken drowned in gloopy sauce, and offer people a taster.

Given the pricing on the main menu, the disparity between the pricing of the set dim sum menu and the a la carte causes some confusion. The latter offers a pan-Asian mix with most main dishes hovering in the £17 to £25 level, the former offers 3 'types' of dim sum for £12. With no idea how much that might deliver us we go a la carte.
  

Mushroom dumplings were green, glutinous and somewhat grim. They filled a steamer basket like claggy shopping bags filled with a lukewarm mushroom vol au vent mix. Similarly, an £8 dish of three unremarkable chicken gyoza arrived flabby and too cold again, their skin lacking any crisp or crunch. Mottled, soft and wrinkled like swimmers who've spent too long in a municipal pool. Overall, the mixed temperature of the food became a lunchtime theme, with most dishes just not hot enough. Admittedly, it's an enormous restaurant, but it didn't take so long to get from the kitchen to justify the tepid temperature of so many dishes.

Ribs were of decent enough quality meat, but had been cruelly treated. Cooked in (or at least covered in) a glossy oilslick of black bean sauce, tasting like a sweet soy that had been punched in the face by a rogue gang of star anise pods and not much more. A rare high came with great tempura prawns. Scattered with a sprinkle of crushed something, jade green methamphetamine maybe, they were as moreish as they were fresh, though four of them for £17.50 is definitely on the steep side. 

Conversely, the T'n'T 'sashimi' pizza (I'm not entirely sure that's where best to place the quotation marks, but they need to go somewhere in a half-baked concept like this) wasn't the best idea of the day. There's a T for the tuna, wafer-thin slices of very good sashimi, thrown away on an over-salted flat biscuit base and violently assaulted with truffle oil (that other T) and acerbic micro greens.

The Chef's sashimi selection was thickly sliced, lumpen and way too cold for the flavours of the fish to have opened up. I wasn't expecting Dinings or Umu standards, but I was hoping for better than M&S. We've moved on with Japanese and Asian dining in the capital, it just doesn't feel like the team at Gilgamesh has noticed. Two pieces each of salmon, tuna, prawn and (I think..) mackerel were plonked down unceremoniously by the server unannounced and unexplained.

At £40 a head for an a la carte lunch with no drinks it's difficult to see me being back to try their evening atmosphere, though I'm sure that for some, the idea of a roped-off luxe lounge in the heart of newly wealthy Camden is de trop. It's a world away from the Hawley Arms that's for sure. But come here for food? I'm not sure I could do it (and I'm not sure anyone else does). It's a gigantic bar and club that also serves food. Overpriced mediocrity I know your name. And it is Gilgamesh.

DISCLAIMER: We were invited to dine here (anonymously) by the restaurant. We walked in unannounced, paid in full and then were refunded by the restaurant PR after we'd left the restaurant. 

 


 

A Wong, Victoria - An interesting addition to London's Chinese restaurant scene - Feb 2013

The feng shui inside might be stunning but it's difficult to imagine many less auspicious locations in zone 1. A Wong sits like a slightly out of place squat granite and glass monolith among the mediocre lunchtime options and sandwich chains of Wilton Road. Laid back decor inside, a clean mix of Scandinavian woodwork and soft straight stone lines.

There are three menus, a lighter dim sum focussed lunch menu, a more substantial evening list and a tasting menu spanning the both. They all dip in and out of a range of regional specialisms, so Sichuan standards like Gong Bao chicken and dry fried beans rub noses with braised lettuce, Imperial dishes and Yangzhou fried rice.

Prices are reasonable across the board, though at £1.50 a piece the dim sum will mount up pretty quickly. It isn't the place for a weekend blow out, but then you're unlikely to see many people round here during the weekend other than the confused tourists disembarking from Victoria station. Of particular note is the express menu, with two courses, a drink (and two lovely salted caramel petits fours) for a very reasonable £12.95.

A trio of dim sum wouldn't usually come close to satisfying me, even as a starter, but these are monsters. That classic shrimp har gau, here at least half again as big as the tiddlers I'm used to in Chinatown, came with an innovative twist, a protective bubble coat of sharp citrus and yuzu foam. That other stalwart pork and prawn siu mai came with its own welcome innovation, a tiny sliver of puffed pork crackling, texturally complimenting the freshly steamed and freshly made parcel. A grease free and delightfully crispy pork wonton completed the set, as delightful a dim sum experience as I've had in this country.

Of the four or so mains offered with the express menu, I went for Sichuanese speciality dan dan mian, or peddler's noodles, named after the distinctive cooking pots they were served from by wandering street sellers. Whenever I've had it before, the soft minced beef, seasoned with those numbing Sichuan peppercorns, mixed with chunks of chilli, veggies and noodles has come in a spicy broth made of noodle water, Shaoshing rice wine and stock. Here it comes, with a few beansprouts and a single vegetable, in a thick meaty gravy, dumped over pedestrian noodles. Not unpleasant per se, but unexpectedly dry, overly rich and not much to my taste.

I'll be back, if not for the tasting menu, certainly for a more detailed examination of the evening menu and some more of that super sized dim sum. The sun was out, and the open plan airy space will be gorgeous come the summer. Let's hope that the locals can tear themselves away from Nando's and the infinitely inferior Dim T just up the road and support the new kid on the block.

  

Leong's Legend - A more than average Chinatown experience - Mar 2012

Whatever you do, don't turn up to Taiwanese institution Leong's Legend without all your party present... I'd have had a better reaction standing outside a school offering peeks at my etchings than having the temerity to arrive friendless at Leongs. On learning that my guest was running late I was made to stand on the staircase, like a chubby schoolboy waiting to see the headmaster, until she arrived. It may have slightly classier decor than other Chinatown joints but the welcome and service are reassuringly brusque. 

We were there on recommendation for the weekend dim sum menu, in case you hadn't noticed, I've become slightly obsessed by the dainty Oriental tapas of late. Once I'd persuaded them that I did have someone joining me and wasn't some sort of solo dining restaurant pest, I took advantage of my guest's tardiness and got my ordering on. She arrived as the food did (or possibly the other way round), my social pariah status at an end. At an average of £3-4 a plate, £25 will more than cover two hungry souls.

It was all fresh and seemingly home made, standout were their siu leung bau, or soup dumplings, steamed purses filled with piquant broth and a hunk of garlicky pork mince. There's nothing finer than taking one of these bad boys onto your spoon, biting the tip off and sucking the fresh hot salty liquor out. At £5.50 for eight pieces, they're also very, very good value and an acceptable lunch in their own right. The char sui bau are also excellent versions of the pillowy soft steamed BBQ buns filled with anunctuous porky sauce. We worked our way through a number of other steamed options and a portion of fresh turnip puffs. If I had one, tiny, criticism it would be that the noodle wrapper on the cheung fun was too thick and chewy but that's the only thing I could score them down for.

The menu goes wider than dim sum, and once you've got past the front door it's cleaner and friendlier than a number of other places along the strip. You wouldn't have a problem bringing clients or parents here and for a weekend lunch service without the frenetic trolley action of New World I'd be happy to recommend Leongs. I'll definitely be back, just as soon as I can get my friends to arrive on time.

  

Another bite of Brixton Market - Feb 2012

As a little foodie cluster, Brixton Village has more than enough ethnic treats to satisfy even the most diverse of foodie. The main problem will be deciding what to go for. Personal highlights include the excellent Honest Burger, Franco Manca (the slew of other, newer openings have thankfully made seats here easier to come by) and Federation's excellent coffee. 

There's a pleasant mix developing between new and old Brixton. The newly opened food stalls complement the peacock finery of the African clothes stores and feel at home alongside the butchers and veg stalls elsewhere. A soundtrack of dub, reggae and itinerant street preacher permeates and there's thankfully little sign of the depressing corporate homogeneity that has neutered Spitalfields, Borough, Camden and the other markets. Brixton does it differently.

Mama Lam is another often mentioned treat, more an appeterif than a main meal, they do a selection of freshly made Chinese jiaozi or potsticker dumplings, a couple of other fried lovelies and intense, flavoursome noodle soups. The tiny outdoor tables are a trial in the winter so grab a place at the counter and watch their Chinese mama deftly roll and fill the little dough parcels, poached then crisped off over hot heat. Fillings include beef, pork and vegetables, five satisfying and fresh buns will set you back a few quid.

A rarer street food is served at Okan, big hearty pancakes from Osaka called Okonomiyaki. Hefty, hearty giant rosti cakes, made with a cabbage and noodle base held together with a sloppy batter, served with a variety of umami rich toppings and fillings. They taste better than they sound and the theatre of them being prepared on their sizzling short order grill is both evocative and famishing...

As well as the three or four places mentioned recently, there are a number of South American places I've subsequently noticed now on my list, a good looking Thai, jerk stalls (though I have my Peckham affinities here) and a selection of other bakeries, grills and goodies alongside non food related retailers old and new school. The continual evolution and ad hoc nature of the place will hopefully bring new places to the market to sink or swim based on satisfaction rather than longevity of lease or depth of corporate pocket.

The finished product

 Looking in at Mama Lam

And the resultant pot stickers

New kid on the block - the Dim Sum Diner - Jan 2012

Great dim sum is one of the world's best meals. A range of tiny parcels and baked goodies, subtly fragranced and served hot from the kitchen to order, ideal for sharing. Average dim sum is forgettable, instantly fading in the memory, good as a temporary pitstop but not really anything more.

Sadly new kid on the block Dim Sum Diner falls firmly into the latter category. It filled a hole, but even an hour after eating Teacher Boy and I struggled to remember the detail of the ones we liked. Writing this up a few days later and I had to fall back on photographs.

There's nothing wrong with the location; a small unit on the populus Queensway drag. The decor is relatively inoffensive; clean, plain and primary coloured surfaces and Wagamamma's style furniture. The staff are friendly, efficient and attentive - the fact we were the only ones in may have helped this. To an extent my ennui came from the prosaic and unimaginative menu; offering a range of dim sum 'classics' (though no cheung fun oddly) and small plate Chinese dishes alongside a random handful of diner fare; mini hot dogs, burgers and a battered fish dropped into the mix for no discernible reason.

Of the good, we enjoyed a punchy and fresh if not terribly authentic Dan Dan Noodle dish. Chilli calmed from the dish's Sichuan street peddlar roots, interpreted here as mince and noodles in a light spicy gravy rather than the tongue tingling peasant soup I would have liked. Still, it was filled with meat and certainly pleasant enough. Pan fried Peking pork dumplings came with moreish dipping sauce, crisp skins and the heat of several suns inside. Steamed pork Xiao Long Bao and hot white clouds filled with sticky Char Sui were perfectly fine. Hot and freshly prepared, I had nothing against them, though the claims that they were 'made in-house with fresh ingredients' were tested by the delivery man walking pre-prepped trayfuls through the restaurant from the outside street.

Sadly the meal went awry with the PR's recommendations. Interesting on paper, disastrous in the mouth. Barbeque Pork Puff Rolls were over-fried cigars with a thick carapace managing to be cloyingly dusty and oil soaked at the same time and filled with red hot viscous gloop. Prawns in a vermicelli crust were drowned in a sweet and sickly mustard sauce that unpleasantly reminded me of an 'experimental' and unsuccessful take on salad cream. Guinness crab meat dumplings were as wrong as they sound.

Despite that, there's much to like. The staff were lovely, the basic dumplings were acceptable and portions are less than £4 each, so it's a reasonably cheap variant, even compared with Soho standards. I'd come back again if I lived or worked in the area though couldn't see myself making a special trip unfortunately.

 Dan Dan Noodles (above) and prawns in a mustard salad cream combi

 The brains below are the Guinness Crab Dumplings... 

   

Dim Sum Challenge - Chinatown beaten by the Elephant and Castle - Nov 11

According to professional food whinger AA Gill, there's not much good going on in Chinatown at the moment. He describes it as a "gaudy, noxious tourist trap selling drunk slop" which while certainly a better turn of phrase than I normally use, is not too far from how I've always seen Chinatown. And to be fair to Mr Gill, a goodly amount of it is onion, gristle and MSG loaded trash. For a country with 1.3 billion inhabitants and many amazing food traditions, it's crazy and sad we have so few of these traditions represented in London's Chinatown.That being said, it's easy to mock an entire area (Clapham for example) and in truth there are a few spots still worthy of note in the area (and one I like particularly that's nowhere near) - if you feel the pull of the original small plates of dim sum.

New World Dim Sum
I've always found the cheap and cheerful New World to be one of the better places for this (assuming my intro hasn't sent you scurrying for a pizza instead). They have the generic Chinglish menu, filled to the gills with Westernised Cantonese classics, but they also race the old fashioned dim sum carts round the massive restaurant, which is hidden down a nondescript side road off Gerrard Street. Outside core lunchtime hours, they'll still do the dim sum, serving instead from a slightly straightened menu of steamed, fried and baked treats, but if you can, get a blast of old Hong Kong and go for a table on the main floor on a Saturday or Sunday lunchtime and watch the carts.
 
Everything on my last visit came freshly made. Prawn chungfun was a good example of the type, sweet prawns wrapped in silken noodle sheets served with soy, BBQ pork buns hot from the steamer, the char siu pork slowly braised in its honey-sweet five spice scented sauce slowly opening under the soft pillowy dough. Beancurd rolls with minced prawn and shrimp are certainly no lookers, extruded tubes of puckered brain, wrapped in the thin beancurd membrane, but here, fresh in a cloud of soy salt steam, they vanish in a flash. The final pair of minced pork and lettuce dumplings are exceptionally fresh and tasty, with a quick fry giving them a chewy outside texture. The juices from the filling spill out of the shells like a salty broth and pour down my chin.

Also in Chinatown - Leong's Legends has its fans, as does Imperial China, and if you fancy something a bit different, then I'd definitely make a beeline for Sichuan restaurant Bar Shu on the other side of Shaftesbury Avenue or the Oriental fusion at Haozhan, one of the few I'll regularly hit up in the area.

 
Dragon Castle
Of course, if you're REALLY into dim sum (and to be honest, what kind of person are you if you're not excited by an endless parade of fried, baked and steamed meaty treasures) then it might be worth a trip to Elephant and Castle, home of Dragon Castle. I've been nudged about this place for several years by Hong Kong Cantonese foodie friends who describe it as a home from home. Despite its unpromising location, surrounded by condemned tower blocks situated off the bleakest roundabout in Zone One, it is where a lot of expats go for their fix.      
The grander than expected entrance opens out into a pleasant space. Location and swift customer turnover aside, they've made an effort to go to town on the interior. Lazy fat carp swim in an ornamental pool reflecting the boarded up walkways of the Heygate estate opposite. It's a hell of a lot of feng shui to lump on a couple of fish, but they stalwartly shoulder (or fin?) the responsibility.


Arriving in traditional plates of three or four items, this is a meal best served family style. If there's not an argument about who hasn't had enough of what, it's not proper. Take a table with the slowly revolving 'lazy Susan' and order a lot: you'll eat it... At around £3 a portion, Dragon Castle is cheaper than most of Chinatown and for a full dim sum blowout washed down with the traditional Jasmine tea, you'll be lucky to top £15 a head between a decent sized group of you.

There's always been debate around whether Dragon Castle has a 'secret' Cantonese menu of local treats, rich in flavour and texture, that they won't serve to Westerners. I've heard this several times, mainly from Cantonese clientele, though on thorough investigation, I've put it down to rumour and the fact that many Chinese won't order from a menu here, they'll simply request their favourites and those will get made. 

Those that do hit up the menu will find it vast. Well over 40 assorted dumplings, buns, puffs and braised bits of tendon to work your way through. To get to the good stuff, I photocopied the menu, took a straw poll of several Cantonese team mates, and gave their recommendations to the waitstaff, asking simply for two portions of everything (there were a few of us, 16 to be precise, a lot of mouths to fill with dumplings...)

The steamed dumplings, particularly the prawn varieties, went down swiftly, as did the various baked pork puffs, hot from the oven, sticky glaze attaching to teeth. Various roast pork buns also proved a success, sweeter than expected. Silken mixed Chung fun and belly sticking turnip cake provided a smooth break to the textural proceedings and from the cryptic end of the menu, Crab Pork Little Lanterns were a marmite call. Deep-fried hollow egg-shaped shells with an almost mucous paste inside, sheltering an umami-rich pork filling. I could have eaten them all afternoon, though the Conologue paused between mouthfuls of textured chicken foot tendon to describe them as pointless clag. We both looked at each other's bowls and laughed. It's the joy of good dim sum, everyone has their favourites and there's (almost) something for everyone. 

Broadway Market highlights: BanhMi'11 and Yum Bun - Momofoko hits London (nearly..)

I've talked before about the life changing pork buns at Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York. Silkily simple steamed white rice buns filled with softest braised pork belly, spring onions and hoisin sauce. Truly god's own bar snack.

I'd never really entertained the hope of these little pats of goodness arriving in London, much less in a recognisable format or as close to the warmly unctuous soft pocket perfection of the originals. As such I was only mildly interested when I first heard about the Yum Bun stall at Broadway Market on a Saturday. "Hackney copycats" quoth I dismissively, certain that they'd not live up to my memories of the original. Lucky for me they were serving their pork filled pockets at the Actor's Touring Company Gala and I was able to sample one or two (definitely no more than three, and only because I was given a spare..) after a spectacular evening at the Arcola watching The Golden Dragon.

They're almost as good. And that's enough for me. The joy of the originals is somewhat in their surroundings. I mean, if I'm eating them, then I'm in New York, and that makes me very happy in itself. These are lacking somewhat on the fat, the Blythburgh pork is damned tasty, but other than one bun they just lacked a bit of the sweetness that comes with a strip of properly melting fat. Other than that, I can't fault them at all.


And if you need another excuse (or two) to go to Broadway Market...

It's home to another of my favourite snacks, possibly the best banh mi in London, served (with enormous snaking queue) at the otherwise utterly delightful BahnMi'11. Marinaded and freshly cooked pork, beef and chicken (not to mention an amazingly piquant turmeric scented catfish) are prepared over authentic Vietnamese griddles and served in homemade rice flour baguettes with coriander, chilli and veggies. Food. Of. Champions.

If that hasn't done it for you, then stick around till the evening, and get involved with the Argentine grill at Buen Ayre (see here for a recent review). While not as well known as Borough or Spitalfields, for the food alone, I'll be making the trip up to tease the trendies again.

Review of Dim T, Fitzrovia - Apr 2010

Where: Dim T, Charlotte Street, Fitzrovia
With whom: the Poker Shark
How much?: steamed dim sum £3.25 for a set of three, noodles and assorted specials for £7-£10... we spent £30 (with a couple of drinks) and had a perfectly acceptable amount.

So Charlotte Street on a (probably the first) warm sunny Friday of the year. So many places we could have ended  up but the Poker Shark was really feeling like dim sum so we ended up in Dim T.


It's a small group with 8 locations, 6 of them in London, and it does have that chain feel to it. The staff are friendly, but not particularly  knowledgeable and while I'd prefer to eat in a hygienic establishment, I'd rather not see bottles of cleaning product on the serving counter.


Similar in style, there are certainly no surprises if you've eaten in the now near ubiquitous Ping Pong. We settled in next to a party of local office workers and ordered a few mixed dishes from the smiling Scandinavian host.


Starting off with a plate of Crispy Duck to share, I wasn't overly impressed with a flabby, overly fatty portion of meat and a sub MacDonald's size portion of overly sweet hoisin. 


The steamed dumplings were better thankfully. We went for the Prawn and Chive and the Mushroom steamed dim sum and a couple of portions of the Char Sui pork buns. The flavours all came through well (with the possible exception of the mushroom, slightly too Cream of Campbell Soup to be honest) but I've definitely had worse. The Char Sui buns were hot, fresh and a definite improvement on Ping Pong - though overall, the whole experience only served to make me crave a proper dim sum blow out... Give me a call if you fancy joining!