Pizzeria Rustica 32 The Quadrant, Richmond, Surrey London TW9 1DN
Reviewed on Tuesday 16 June 2009
Pizzeria Rustica
Rustica upstairs
We have tried many pizzerias in London and I have to say the best pizzas are made at Rustica, followed closely by Franco Manca. That is based on the pizzas only. If I count the surrounding, Rustica wins by a huge margin. The location first: let’s not be cruel by comparing Richmond to Brixton market. Second, the design of the restaurant is also a lot better. Rustica is a charming relaxing restaurant while Franco Manca is more canteen-like and within a market, next to a fish stall. Just as well because Richmond costs about double even if still being reasonably priced.
We did not take any starters since their pizzas are quite large and we ordered two pizzas, a capricciosa (£9.90) and a buffalo (£9.95), with two Moretti beers (£6.50). The beers could have been colder for my liking. The capricciosa was very good, with a nice crispy base, and the right amount of toppings. The usual good experience. The buffalo was excellent, as usual, should I say! I love the buffalo mozzarella. One distinctive feature of the buffalo pizza is that the toppings (parma ham, tomato bruschetta and mozarella) are added fresh on a cooked pizza base so the base stays crispy. The chilli oil was very lightly spicy and it poured incredibly slowly – a lot of work to get enough on your pizza. I prefer when it is very spicy (hot) like they often do in France.
Inside Rustica
Pizza Capricciosa
Pizza Buffalo & the chilli oil
Overview of the two pizzas
The desserts were a homemade carrot cake and a Baileys cheesecake. The carrot cake was very good. Nice and chunky, and not over-sweet as is often the case. That includes for the icing/topping, which was just sweet enough to match the cake nicely. The Baileys cheesecake was great. Not too sweet either and the right amount of Baileys. A little complaint here: the tables are so close together that it can be hard to have a decent conversation if you happen to have loud/talkative neighbours. Also, if it just happens (as it did) that you have a neighbour who orders something smelly like fish at the time you are up to dessert, then the proximity of the smell is a bit off-putting.
Homemade carrot cake
Baileys cheesecake
Overview of the two desserts
Cost and conclusion: it was £36 and it is up to you to leave the gratuity or not and how much. I like that! It is just very rude to automatically add an “optional” 12.5% service charge to the bill and to assume the service was worth it. Here the service was excellent, with a very friendly italian staff so they deserved a good tip You can read previous reviews of Rustica here (22 March 2009) and here (2 May 2009).
Pizzeria Rustica is located next to Richmond train station, but it is also only 15 minutes walk from Richmond Park which is the largest open space in London covering almost 1000 hectares. It is home to around 650 free roaming deer so if you are into photography and wildlife, it is a good spot to visit. Below is a photo of a deer I took there.
A deer hiding in the bush at Richmond Park
Tokiya Sushi Bar 74 Battersea Rise London SW11 1EH http://www.tokiya.co.uk
Reviewed on Sunday 14 June 2009
Tokiya Sushi Bar
I was looking for a real Japanese restaurant near Wandsworth Common and I finally found it! The restaurant is run by a couple of Japanese people who are originally from Sapporo. The sushi chef has over 30 years of experience and I have to say the food was simply delicious. The design inside is mostly black and it feels like a Japanese diner. At the entrance there is a Maneki Neko – the welcoming cat.
We ordered as starters an Agedashi tofu (Deep fried tofu with tempura sauce – £3.80), the California roll (5 pieces) made of avocado & crab stick & small fish roe with mayonnaise (£4.50) and the spicy salmon roll (5 pieces) made of spicy salmon with mayonnaise (£5). The beers were a Sapporo and an Asahi (£3.20 each). The spicy salmon was indeed hot. It does not get you instantly like a wasabi but it burns the mouth lightly. The California rolls were also very good. With the mayonnaise these Japanese dishes aren’t completely authentic but they are still very good The tofu was yummy and very hot! Be sure to cut it instead of taking the whole tofu at once. You are warned 😉
As main courses we had tonkatsu (Deep fried pork fillet – £9) and salmon teriyaki (Grilled Salmon with teriyaki sauce – £8). We also ordered two bowls of steamed plain rice (£1.50 each). The salmon was very good, with a crispy skin while being tender inside. The taste of the teriyaki sauce was perfect, not too sweet. The tonkatsu was perfectly cooked, crispy and not greasy. With the bulldog sauce and the Japanese mustard it was a very good meal.
As dessert I had an ice cream with green tea and black sesame flavour. It was lovely, very smooth. I love the green tea sweet and bitter taste and the particular taste of the sesame was really good. It is easy to write a review when everything is good… If I’m picky, I can find a few downsides: the bowl containing the tofu was a little chipped, the beer could have been colder. Well, they are pretty minor.
Asahi and Sapporo beers
Excellent Agedashi Tofu (£3.80)
California Roll & Spicy salmon Roll
Tonkatsu (£9)
Salmon Teriyaki (£8)
Overview of the two main courses
Green tea and black sesame ice cream
Cost and conclusion: the total cost was just below £40 and there is no service charge as is the custom in Japan. We appreciate it. The food was excellent and the service friendly. I wish I had discovered this place sooner! We will be back!
Terroirs Wine Bar & Restaurant 5 William IV Street London WC2N 4DW
Reviewed on Saturday 13 June 2009
Terroirs
I like the presentation of Terroirs with its different levels. In the basement you have the wine bar and the ground level at the right when you enter is for the restaurant. It feels like a bistrot in France. The waiters are very likely French by the way. We had a table next to the windows and we found the ventilation in our location weak: we were overheating a little. It must be an ongoing problem since there was a fan right behind us (see photo 3 below). It was too close to be directed on us unfortunately.
Inside Terroirs
First thing we ordered was the bread and butter (£1.50) and a tapenade & crostini (£2.50). The bread was excellent, really very good. The tapenade was not so good and we waited for a while before it arrived. We thought it was forgotten. I found it too much on the salty side but then I am maybe spoiled getting “real” tapenade going monthly to Nice where my parents live. The crostini was too greasy, not sure what kind of oil they used but it tasted of nothing. Just hard and greasy. The still water (£1.50) was needed. The bread was a much better match with the tapenade than the crostini it came with.
Nice bread & butter (£1.50)
Tapenade & Crostini (£2.50)
The tapenade was a little too salty and the crostini too greasy unfortunately
For main courses we chose from the plats du jour the braised shoulder of Cornish lamb, couscous, aubergine & harissa (£14) and the slow cooked Suffolk pork belly, chick peas and morcilla (£13). The red wine was a Domaine Causse Marines 2006 Gaillac Rouge “Peyrouzelles” (£29) which was great. I saw online you can buy 6 bottles for £ 13.99 each so the restaurant price is just twice the retail price which is very good. At Albannach it was over four time the normal price…
The pork belly wasn’t too good. It was mostly fat, with very little meat attached, and very salty in patches. The “crispy” skin wasn’t so much crispy as rock hard with some risk of damaging your teeth (for those with dentures – consider yourself warned!) and the chickpeas were just nasty (very bland). Overall, a very disappointing meal which wasn’t helped by the small serving dish with high sides which necessitated a vertical attack with cuttlery and made it very difficult to cut the meat. Most of this dish went back to the kitchen uneaten. If you want a decent pork belly, you can get much bigger, better (and cheaper at less than £10) not far away at the Ship Tavern in Holborn.
The braised shoulder of Cornish lamb was good and it was nicely presented with the aubergine on top of it. It was very tender and it did not smell too much of the lamb. The couscous was fine but I was disappointed not to have more harissa, especially since I lived in Tunisia for some time where the harissa originates from. There was just a tiny little red patch and that was it. If it is that small to the point you cannot taste it, why to bother promoting it on the menu? Same remark as above about the small deep dish. It is cute but it does not help for eating the couscous.
Slow cooked Suffolk pork belly, chick peas and morcilla (£13)
Braised shoulder of Cornish lamb, couscous, aubergine & harissa (£14)
While the lamb was fine (the plate is empty), the pork belly was not great and the chick peas just bad.
As dessert we ordered a panna cotta, English raspberries (£5) and a bitter chocolate pot (£5). The raspberries (all 5 of them) were fine, but the panna cotta had a very fake flavour, was over-sweet and somewhat slimy texture that wasn’t too pleasant. Another abandonment. The bitter chocolate pot was indeed bitter but it was unremarkable. I ate it because I was hungry.
Panna cotta, English raspberries (£5)
Bitter chocolate pot (£5)
The bitter chocolate pot was ok, but we could not eat the awful panna cotta.
Cost and conclusion: it was just below £80, with the “optional service charge of 12.5%” included. We found it very overpriced for what it was. The atmosphere and decor was nice but the most important, the food, was not up to our expectation with some of it being seriously bad. Still, the atmosphere was good and the wine well priced so as a wine bar we can imagine this place can be quite good. The service was friendly.
British Restaurant Lamberts 2 Station Parade, Balham High Road London SW12 9AZ
Reviewed on Thursday 11 June 2009
Lamberts
Lamberts is a surprising restaurant. From outside the first impression is not good. It is squeezed between a store selling junk like CDs, smoke smell remover etc and a Firefly bar. Once you are inside things are much better. It is bigger than it looked and designed in a smart modern way. The tables are pretty close together though, so it is not good for private conversations.
They have an interesting mid-week set menu (2 courses for £20 or 3 courses for £24) but we were more attracted by meals that were not included in the set menu. As starters we ordered the seared venison, white beans, aubergine and watercress pesto (£7) and a chargrilled cornish squid, black pudding and curly endive salad (£7). A few slices of bread were offered with a little pot of oil. The bread was nice and fresh, but we did not find it good. It was a little sweet like a brioche but too salty at the same time. A bottle of chilled tap water was provided too which is nice.
The venison was excellent. Very nicely cooked, tender and complemented well by the pesto. The white beans were a slightly strange accompaniment though, and the plate it was served in may have looked nice, but didn’t make it very easy to eat the meal elegantly. A bit more practicality required. The chargrilled cornish squid was really good too. Warm, a little crispy on the outside with a kind of very light barbecue taste. The black pudding was on the salty side but with the endive salad and the squid it was a good balance. It could have been warmer though.
Seared venison, white beans, aubergine and watercress pesto
Chargrilled cornish squid, black pudding and curly endive salad
As main courses we chose the wood pigeon, roast foie gras, pearl barley and braised chicory (£18) and a “Rare Breed Beef from the Chargrill – sourced from farms in Scotland and Denham Estate in Suffolk” which happened to be a Galloway sirloin (£18). The desserts were a passion fruit tart, raspberry coulis & crème fraîche (£6) and a four British cheese from Neal’s Yard Dairy (£8). The wine was an excellent Argentinian Passo Doble 2007, Malbec-Corvina, Masi Tupungato (£28).
Like the venison, the beef was excellent. One of the best steaks I have had in London. I am glad I asked for medium rare – what I got was closer to what I would consider medium (which is to say, nicely pink in the middle), and exactly how I like it. It was nicely browned on the outside, with just a touch of burn to give it flavour, pink and tender in the middle, but not at all bloody. I didn’t think too much of the accompaniments though – some floury chips and a fried tomato. That’s a bit more what I would expect from a steakhouse or in an all-day-breakfast. There was no choice of sauce – fine, since I like bearnaise – but bad luck for anyone who does not. It was a good bearnaise. I ate pigeons only once previously, and that was in 1986. They were pigeons I hunted when I lived in Ivory Coast, so I was curious about eating that meat again. I am glad to report the wood pigeon was perfectly cooked and the meat was tender. Actually I chose that meal mostly for the roast foie gras, it happened it was served with a wood pigeon 😉 The foie gras was excellent with a wonderful taste and melting smoothly in the mouth!
Passo Doble 2007
Galloway sirloin
The wood pigeon with the roast foie gras on top
The four British cheeses from Neal’s Yard Dairy were good and served with oatcakes – but for £8 I cannot help comparing the 4 cheeses chosen for you at Lamberts with the fantastic cheese board and wide selection the customer gets to choose from at Bellevue Rendez-vous not far away for about the same price. The passion fruit tart was very good – and for once they got the accompaniments exactly right. The tart itself was a little too sweet for my taste, but it was nicely balanced by the raspberry coulis and creme fraiche – both of which were sour. The overall effect was just right.
Four British cheese
Passion fruit tart
Cost and conclusion: it was £103.50 including the “discretionary service charge of 12.5%”. You know I am against the service charge automatically added to the bill. It should be up to the client to decide what he wants to give, or not. The first bill came with an error overcharging me because of a set menu being added to the bill. The waitress apologised and quickly corrected the mistake without discussion. Talking about the service, it was friendly and efficient. Details would be given on each cheese, the kind of cow breed per example. It is nice to see the waitresses being involved in what they serve. It is a little difficult to evaluate Lamberts. The food was good but not perfect and a little overpriced. Not far away and in a much better surrounding than Balham train station (next to Wandsworth common) you can go to Chez Bruce which is a French style Michelin-starred restaurant where the set menu costs £40 for three courses. It will be more expensive but it is also one of the top restaurants in London. Near Chez Bruce you have Bellevue Rendez-vous which is a family run French restaurant with an excellent value for money (around £70 for two, also three courses and bottle of wine included).
Double Espresso 13 Station Parade, Balham High Road SW12 9AZ London
Reviewed on Tuesday 9 June 2009
Double Espresso
Inside the restaurant
The first things you see when you enter in Double Espresso are the cakes in the refrigerated display. After all this place is also a coffee place and it can be nice to sit outside on the large sidewalk. The restaurant is not very big. It is dominated by a large counter and on top of it there is a TV. The atmosphere is very relaxed: I like it. It looks as though the place is family owned.
As starters we ordered the Involtini Di Prosciutta (melted mozzarella cheese wrapped in slices of parma ham – £6) which was amongst the specials of the day, and a Formaggio Di Capra Grigliato (grilled goat’s cheese on toasted bread and mixed grilled veg – £5.50). They were followed by two pizzas: a pizza Double Espresso (made of mozzarella, tomato, prawns, basil, blue cheese and garlic – £8.50) and a pizza Fiorentina (£7.20). The red wine was a Merlot Malbec 2007 from Distant Land in New Zealand (£20) which was quite enjoyable.
The melted mozzarella were quite good, and the slices of parma ham were slightly crispy and fortunately not too dry. The salad was a good addition to them. It was “only” three pieces but they were quite filling so you are warned! The goat cheese could just have used a little extra virgin olive oil to set it off. As it was, it was just a little bland.
The pizzas were made of an extremely thin base. We like that. From where we were we could see the pizzaiolo preparing them. He was nice enough to invite us to take a photo closer when he noticed we were taking photos As it was their “home” pizza I chose the Double Espresso. I have to say I was not too sure about the mix between prawns and blue cheese but hey, only one way to find out! Actually it was a pretty good pizza. The prawns were big enough to have a taste and the blue cheese was not too strong. I wished the garlic was stronger but I am a garlic fan. The Fiorentina was good, with the egg perfectly cooked: still liquid but not running. It lacked some flavour though. We finished the meal with two Limoncello.
Involtini Di Prosciutta
Formaggio Di Capra Grigliato
Overview of the two starters. The bottle of red wine was a NZ Merlot Malbec 2007 from Distant Land.
Preparing the pizza!
Pizza Double Espresso "raw"
On its way to the oven! Nice pizzaiolo!
Cooked pizza Double Espresso
Pizza Fiorentina
Limoncello
Cost and conclusion: it was just under £60 with service charge included. Considering we had two starters, two pizzas, a bottle of wine that was not cheap and two Limoncello (served wonderfully cold) it is good value for money. The food was good, the service friendly: it is a very decent option if you are in the area, and it is much better than Cattle Grid located on the other side of Balham train station.
