danielcollins

Haha, not quite, I'm still at the stage of my life where it is perfectly fine to share a slightly dilapidated old house with 3 other people! So what’s good in Streatham?

Having left Scotland to make my fortune in England’s glittering, gold-paved capital, I have been surprised to see very little culinary coverage of my new neighbourhood, East Dulwich. Within a five minute walk you can get decent French bistro (Le Chardon), very good British (Palmerston and, more impressively. Franklins), excellent Indian (Tandoori Nights, and ,if you can handle the schlep, Ganapati) and tremendous pizza and beers at the Gowlett (best pub in SE London?). On top of this we have a great butcher (William Rose), fishmonger (Moxons) and cheese shop (the Cheese Block), as well as a good if very overpriced deli. So I'm using my first 'new topic' on eGullet to simultaneously pay my respects to my newfound home and also hopefully to be guided towards some more of London’s unsung hotspots

Turned up here two Saturdays ago on the spur of the moment, having eaten at Arbutus the week before. We were sat at the bar, which was perfectly comfortable and gave a nice buzz with all the bar staff whizzing around in front of us. I had the smoked eel followed by the lamb. Eel was delicious, fatty and mouth filling, wonderful when paired with the fig jam. The raw vegetable salad offered little by way of taste, but added a welcome bit of crunch to the dish. Lamb was tasty but uninteresting, a wee bit overcooked, and the accompaniments didn't stay long in the memory. To finish I had the chocolate soup (it's a warm mousse) which was delicious and incredibly rich, which came with a scoop of wonderful nougat ice-cream. My companion went with beetroot and goats cheese salad (fantastic, with excellent cheese), sea bass with shrimp and cobnuts (well cooked, but a bit 'flung together', the flavours didnt seem to gel) and honey ice-cream (perfect). The wine list was (as far as I could tell) identical to Arbutus, which is no bad thing, and the room was really welcoming and attractive (save for the genuinely terrifying clown painting hanging directly behind our seats). Service was as good as I have experienced since my first visit to Bacchus in December (i think) and the head barman in particular was friendly and knowledgeable. The bill came to pretty much exactly £100, and on the whole was definitely worth it. My one concern after having visited both Wild Honey and Arbutus, is that the starters and desserts far outshine the main courses, in terms of imagination and execution. This may well be down to poor selections on my part, if anyone can make any recommendations I would be most grateful. Oh and hello by the way, first post etc etc