Hello Garmanvsfood family, we are slowly getting into warm(ish) months! How we all doing? First quarter of the year gone, less winter blues and more spring and summer vibes yes? I am looking forward to summer, just because this winter is on a looooonnnng ting! I am soo over it.
To help us chase away our winter blues, we are ‘road testing’ Elystan street restaurant for our food adventure. We heard about this place from our fellow diners (turned friends) at Aulis restaurant, and today seemed to be the perfect day to give it a go. Located in the niffy suburb of South Kensington, we rocked up, without a reservation! Honestly, what are we like eh? we checked the opening times and turned up. Thinking about it, for restaurants where we didn’t make a reservation, we usually get there early and as lady luck would have it, we get a table almost all the time. The tip here is to get there early, just as service is about to start, smile and voila. If you have a Neal, then you are most certainly going to get a table. What can I say, it’s the ginger combined with the Northern charm.
I cannot emphasise enough how an experience can go from zero to hero because of the human element. Massive shout out to our head waiter, Harvey, he makes the best rhubarb sour cocktail!
The restaurant does not offer a taster menu but best believe when I say that, whatever you eat here is going to be truly special. In true Neal and Ndidi fashion, we sampled a few of the starters, well, 4 of the 6 starters and I stan!
The carpaccio beef with black pepper, smoked sea salt, parmesan and olive oil was interesting. The beef was cured, thinly cut and flavoured with the black pepper, salt, parmesan and olive oil and DONE! Sounds basic, yes, but there was nothing basic about the taste. All the flavours came together perfectly and that sums up the food here. Every dish comes together in harmony that your palate praises the food gods! like ALLELUIA!!!!
Take the duck eggs mayonnaise with leek hearts, pickled mushrooms, cracked hazelnuts and truffle. First off I could not visualise what this dish could look like, I mean I came up with nothing! Zilch! I cant be blamed though, cos, the ingredients are things you use to make a sandwich, aside from the truffle of course. I asked Neal to describe it and he says to me “really nice and well balanced”. Err .. I don’t think so. His words don’t do the dish justice so I am going to do the right thing. Listen! This dish was IT, the shizzle, the BUSINESS! It was a cold dish yes, but it was creamy with layers of depth and flavour that hits you like BOOM!
Does roasted carrots with tarama, puntarella anchovy salad and red wine sound like a winning combination? No right? Don’t worry I thought the same thing when I saw this on the menu. And this is why chefs are in a league of their own and are a representation of food gods here on earth. This plate of veggies was the very cool kind you know? The tarama was dripped all over the roasted carrot, the darn thing looked like some chocolate thingy magic ‘pon the plate with the salad and red wine dressing. It tasted yum and crunchy. I like when my veggies have a crunch in the bite!
I am still getting my head around risotto. It is one of those dishes where I have never cooked myself but love trying out in restaurants. Most places serve traditional looking risotto in a cream sauce or with mushrooms, or sea food mix. Chef Sam decided to serve us risotto in squid ink, basically (black) risotto with squid, mussels, fennel and gremolata and I loved it! The gremolata was a mix of herbs and spice consisting of lemon zest, garlic, parsley. This dish was popping! POPPING! It was just too good; the flavours were just amazing, and you know I had to use a piece of bread to mop up all that olive oil sauce goodness!
I have it on good authority that Chef Sam’s short rib is darn good. According to Neal “this beef is bloody good”! It was short rib with bavette of Cumbrian beef with stuffed field mushroom, potato galettes and red wine. The stuffed mushroom though, was so good! It is one of the bigger mushrooms I have seen too. The scallops were fresh as you please and the sauces on each dish was just fantastic!
There were 5 different desserts to choose from so you could say we were spoilt for choice! Now y’all know I am a sucker for ice cream so the chocolate, peanut and caramel bar with hazel nut ice cream was a no brainer! When I tell you, it was sinfully delicious! Jeessus! It was good. it was literally a chocolate bar – more like a block of chocolate, peanut and caramel goodness served with the most delicious creamy hazel nut ice cream! HEAVEN! We also tried a rhubarb-based dessert only because Harvey came through with the best rhubarb sours cocktail, plus, I was curious about what lemon posset with rhubarb, donut and blood orange would taste like. It was good y’all, G-O-O-D! Rhubarb is already quite sweet so whilst this pudding was sweet, I didn’t find it too sweet which can be off putting. I enjoyed the donut, I haven’t had that in a while. Neal on the other hand was in his element. Not only is he well into his chocolate, he can do very sweet things too, he thoroughly enjoyed helping me with my chocolate bar as well as having most of the posset to himself!
of course we gave the cheeses a go to, what you take us for eh?
Whilst enjoying digestif – tea, Chef Sam stopped by to have a chat with us! I don’t think I will ever get enough of meeting these wonderful people who create food that brings me so much joy. He was so gracious and even gave us a jar of truffles to take away. Yasssss! Chef Sam, come on now!
Elystan street, you were a road test and the drive was worth it!
Cheers
Ndidi & Neal
p.s the man of the hour
