Review: Chilli Cool, Kings Cross
Living in Peckham, like many others, I have succumbed to the charms and delights of the wonderful Silk Road restaurant in Camberwell. It’s unusual Xinjiang-style of Chinese cuisine contrasting splendidly with standard Cantonese fare.
On the recommendation of some professional critics, and whilst looking for somewhere to eat near Kings Cross, I ventured on Sunday evening to Chilli Cool. Whilst being Szechuan in origin, it’s authentic sounding dishes compared admirably to Silk Road in their heavy use of chilli and meaty broths.
The first thing to note was that it was very busy. In fact I can’t remember the last time I saw a restaurant this busy on a Sunday night. The waiting staff were efficient and helpful throughout the night though.
Unfortunately the food was a bit of a let down. Maybe we ordered the wrong things. No “famous” oxtail for us. But if a dish isn’t any good, in my book, it shouldn’t be on the menu.
Appetizers and mains don’t really arrive as such. Mains came first. A rich beef soup with fried beef and chilli was certainly unctuous but lacked nuance or vibrancy.
Deep fried spare ribs were tasty and had the requisite chewy-ness but lacked punch. The best main was undoubtedly the chilli and sesame crab. Truly delicious morsels of crab with a heady chilli and sesame combo let down only by a lack of tools for cracking through the shell. At one point I became so impatient at my own lack of dexterity I resorted to just crunching the shell up with meat – not bad as a one off but I wouldn’t recommend it for a whole crab.
A solitary side of green beans with minced pork divided opinion on the table between those who thought they were overcooked and shrivelled and those who believe the addition of pork to any vegetable dish enables you to look past any other faults.
Starters, when they arrived, were frankly horrid. Slices of pig ear and another dish of shredded potato are served stone cold and suffered from a lack of crunch and an excess of grease. Aubergine was tepid and slightly better but lacked the flavour of a similar dish at Silk Road.
Two further points are worth making. First – I like chillies. I like chilli oil. And having eaten this sort of cuisine before I’m under no illusion as to the propensity for both. But the astonishing amount used at Chilli Cool was staggering. And whilst they often failed to impart that nice heat into the food, one attempt to eat one was me by what I imagine the symptoms of a stroke are complete with loss of feeling in one side of my face. Second, it was pricey. I’m used to getting out of Silk Road utterly stuffed and having had at least two beers for £15 a head. Here a bill for three people having had just four beers was £76. Frankly I think that’s way too high for the quality of the food.
In a word: disappointing.
Viet-Van, North Cross Road, SE22
Vietnamese food has been the big success story in the London world food scene over the last few years. And Banh-Mi, or Vietnamese baguettes, have been the success story of Vietnamese food. Filled with a mixture of salad, pate, meat, and chillis they offer quick, convenient and tasty fast food for time pressed London denizens.
Having previously tried Panda Panda in Deptford, imagine my delight at finding David Parkin of Viet-Van on North Cross Road, my local market street in East Dulwich. David had fallen in love with Vietnamese food when he was on holiday there and has now started re-creating banh-mi for hungry Saturday shoppers.
He offers a chicken, pork or vegetarian filling which is then combined with pate, salad, fresh chillis and special sauces.
They were fresh tasting and, considering the size of my hangover and the noise my stomach was making with every rumble, proved perfect foil. The only slight complaint is that David is using standard wheat-flour baguettes rather than the traditional rice-flour variety used in Vietnam. This means that the are a touch too heavy but not enough to make a real difference. And that’s only because I’m nit-picking.
North Cross Road on a Saturday is now a bit of a foodie delight with meat, cheese, bread and salad stalls now joined by a hog roast, meatballs, hotdogs and now banh-mi. It is a worthy addition and deserves your attention.
Smoked Ham Hock and White Bean Casserole
Winter is fast approaching, nights are drawing in and my mind is turning away from quickly cooked chops and light salads towards hearty, warming stews and rich casseroles that have been cooked long and slow for the best flavours.
I had purchased a bargain-basement and terribly frugal smoked ham hock from my local butcher (take a bow William Rose) and decided it would be perfect for just such a dish. My new found love of Mrs Creosote’s slow cooker ( a proper 1970s throwback) meant that it cooked all day whilst I was at work and came home to the most glorious smells wafting from the kitchen. If you don’t own a slow cooker, 4 hours in a low oven would create the desired effect.
1 smoked ham hock (soaked in water overnight to remove excess salt)
250g white beans – I used Argentinian White Beans (soaked in water overnight)
2 onions, roughly chopped
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
1 tablespoon tomato puree
1 tin tomatoes
500ml stock (I used veal but chicken or vegetable would be fine)
2 bay leaves
Worcestershire Sauce
Fry the onions and garlic in a little olive oil til soft and slightly golden and then add the tomato puree. Cook for another 5 minutes. Add the tin of tomatoes and stir. Place the ham hock in your slow cooker or casserole pot and pour over the onion and tomato mixture. Add the beans, stock, bay leaves and a liberal dash of worcestershire sauce. Stir thoroughly and then cook for a long time on a low heat. Mine was in the slow cooker for about 10 hours. Before serving remove the ham hock and discard the bones and fat. The ham will easily fall into small pieces. Stir back into the stew. I added a salsa verde to cut through the richness which worked rather well.
1 handful mint, finely
chopped
1 handful parsley, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp capers, finely chopped
Zest of 1 lemon
Half tbl spoon of red wine vinegar
2 tbl spoons olive oil
Salt and pepper
Combine all the ingredients in a bowl. You may want to adjust the oil/vinegar ratio according to how piquant you like your salsa verde. Spoon a dollop of sauce into your bowl of casserole.
Eat. Enjoy. And relish the coming of winter.
In praise of mutton
I’ve just finished eating a rather tasty mutton stew for my lunch. It was left over from one I made yesterday for dinner in Mrs Creosote’s slow-cooker (which I may return to later) and it got me thinking about mutton.
The stew itself was nothing special. A few root veg (onion, garlic, carrot, parsnip) and some stock was about it. I was out of red wine (*gasp*) which would have improved things significantly. But the mutton itself was delicious – slightly fattier than lamb but with significantly more depth of flavour and much cheaper. I paid about £3 for half a kilo.
Yet I suspect that very few people will have ever eaten mutton or would be able to find it in their local supermarket. It has an unenviable reputation as being tough and indeed it is if you don’t know how to cook it. Flash fried or quickly grilled it would be grim, but stewed slowly for hours it transforms into a succulent, meltingly tender animal that begs every last morsel of flesh to be sucked from its bones.
The unpopularity of mutton is symptomatic of the current British obsession with all things lean. Lean mince, lean cuts of beef, and (horror of horrors) lean pork chops all occupy our supermarket shelves. But often these cuts are flavourless. Why? Because, for the most part, fat = flavour. In these health-conscious times that seems an anathema to many, but served in small portions with steamed vegetables, for example, there is no reason why these older, fattier cuts of meat should not play a major role in British diets.
So pop along to your nearest butcher and see if you can get your hands on some mutton, a proper cockerel for sumptuous coq-au-vin or another unpopular, unloved cut of meat. Your wallet and your taste buds will thank you for it.
Last days of Summer….
A glorious weekend here in the South East. Mrs Creosote and I decided to make the most of it and head off for the day. We motored along out of London and into North Kent. Sun shining and Chuck Berry on the stereo, we were already happy bunnies.
Our first stop was Whitstable. A pretty, quaint seaside town with a harbour front packed with seafood stalls. We had started out thinking about a formal, sit-down Sunday lunch but after trying the wares of the first oyster stall abandoned all plans for merely munching down as much seafood as possible. Spankingly fresh oysters, gloriously sweet roll-mops, cockles liberally doused in vinegar and pink baby prawns.
It was also excellent value. Oysters were shucked in front of you and sold for 50p each. I managed 6 without blinking and the rollmops were some of the sweetest I’ve tasted.
Washed down with a pint of Guinness and after soaking up some rays wandering the beach it was a brilliant start to the day.
We then drove on to Brogdale. It’s the home of the national fruit collection and possibly the most English scene you can picture. Orchards full of apples, pears, plums, cherries and any other fruit that it is possible to grow in this green and pleasant land.
For £7 you get a guided tour with a (hilariously eccentric
) tour guide who is full of knowledgeable facts and info. Did you know that they have over 550 varieties of pear? No? You do now. We ate lots of samples on the way round, but, due to the time of year this mainly consisted of apples. The Hereforshire Russet was a particular favourite with its gnarly skin and combination of sweet and bitter tastes.
But Mrs Creosote and I fell in love with damsons. A few were left at the end of their season and despite being told they would be lacking flavour by our guide the ones we found were still delicious. Come December we might even buy a tree which apparently will thrive in our small, shady patch of Peckham. Damson jam and wine are also a possibility.
If you haven’t ever visited Whitstable or Brogdale, I encourage you go forthwith.
All-in-all, one of the best days of the year.
The world of Mr Creosote
Moules marinieres, pate de foie gras, beluga caviar, eggs benedict, a leek tart, frogs’ legs amandine and quail’s eggs on a bed of mushrooms all mixed together in a bucket with the quail eggs on top and a double helping of pate. And for aperitifs, six bottles of Château Latour 1945, a double jeroboam of champagne, and half a dozen crates of brown ale. Considerably less than my normal allowance.
I’m not quite as indulgent as Mr Creosote is, and I’ve yet to literally explode (although I’ve come close a few times) but you get the gist.
I eat, I cook. And now, seemingly, I blog too. Hopefully there will be recipes, restaurant reviews, the odd food essay or discourse and some occasional meanderings. I hope you enjoy.
And whilst the world is full of food blogs, one more couldn’t hurt. After all, it is only wafer thin!
