Last week I went to Ink. I was a guest. Zomato hooked me up. All praise Zomato. It’s a restaurant in Bethnal Green, but it’s not your usual Bethnal Green type of restaurant.
To start with it’s pretty hard to find. It’s on the ground floor of a residential building, so you kind of feel that you’re skulking around somewhere you shouldn’t be. Then you see the sign finally come into view and all is right with the world again.
Once through the door a welcoming glass of Prosecco was thrust in my hand and I joined everyone else on the balcony. The benefit of housing this establishment in an out of the way residential building is that you forget you’re in Bethnal Green. There’s a canal and a lush grassy landscape to behold, which is a bit more pleasant than a streetscape of folorn hipsters. Anyway, on to more important things. We were invited there to try Ink’s new 72 hour tasting menu. You give them 72 hours notice, a heads up about any food allergies, and they’ll create an immaculate 7 course tasting menu just for you, complete with a glass of wine matched to every dish. All for £72. Just adding up the cost of 7 glasses of classy wine alone makes this a good deal, and when you realise they’re also designing a bespoke menu for you for this price you do that thing where you jump a little and click your heels together, and then you realise that you’re not a tap dancer in the 1960s and you didn’t really wear an appropriate bra for jumping tonight so you can just calm down there, all right?
There are many good things about a tasting menu. For example, you get to taste lots of different foods. Also, the portions are small, so even if they serve something you don’t usually like there’s a good chance of you enjoying it as you can ‘taste’ it without being overwhelmed by an entire meal. And if you really don’t like it, don’t worry, it won’t be here long and there’s probably something better on its way. With each course delivered to our hungry table the chef, Martyn Meid, a Lithuanian with a steely glance and a passion for food, joined us and explained his inspiration behind our dish.
Let’s start from the beginning, shall we? I can explain more as we move chronologically through the gastronomical gusto. We were encouraged to think of each course as the chapter of a book – a small section of a larger story.
So. Let’s begin with Chapter 1: Flat bread, bone marrow and radishes.
Wine: Picpoul d Pinet, Villemarin, France
This was my least favourite dish, so I was happy to get it out of the way early. We were warned that some people complained that the flat bread was ‘tasteless’, but it was supposed to be. I loved the flatbread. I could happily munch it all day. It would be fantastic with a variety of dips. The radishes, however, were radishes. Stuff them with bone marrow all you like, you’re still making me eat a whole radish. No thank you. I haven’t slipped quite that far down the food chain just yet.
Chapter 2. Hand picked Scottish scallops, burnt onion, peach puree
Wine: Picpoul d Pinet, Villemarin, France
This was a magical dish. This was when Martyn suddenly announced to us with much enthusiasm, “I like to burn things”. Yes, he certainly does. I, however, truly appreciate a chargrilled tang with most things so I was in my element. The burnt onion was reminiscent of New Zealand sausage sizzles – barbecues for those not in the know.
It was at this point I realised wine might be a problem. I had hurriedly finished my Prosecco while on Chapter 1, and now was working my way through two new glasses….
Chapter 3. Lobster with cucumber textures.
Wine: Baron de Baussac Viognier
As you can see, there’s a lot of seafood happening with this menu. Not usually my thing, but the joy of the tasting menu means you can taste. It’s lobster. It looks pretty. What’s not to like.
Chapter 4. Pea and quail egg
Wine: Fernlands Sauvignon Blanc. New Zealand
Another tiny dish, beautifully arranged and it sparked much debate about how to eat a quail’s egg. I figured you just ate it. I did. I was right. It was also the dish where a pea tried to get away and I was much concerned. All that wine was really kicking in now. In fact, the sauce was delivered separately to the dish and this confused me a great deal.
Chapter 5. Monk fish, celeriac butter purée with young carrots, parsnips, raisins and chives
Wine: Claro reserva, Pinot NoirThe most important concept of this dish is butter. Butter, butter, butter. The monk fish is there too, but he’s playing second fiddle to all that butter. I am quite drunk at this point so you can imagine my excitement. In fact, the entire table quite well lubricated. The conversation turns to tinder and dating in general. I’ve never been on tinder and I have no real dating experience. Turns out I still have quite a lot to say on the subject…
Tim for a palate cleanser: Japanese beer sorbet. A lager type concoction that reminds you of kissing your husband when he’s just wandered in late after a night out and wants to kiss you goodnight. Well, it reminds me of kissing my husband. It probably won’t remind you of kissing my husband. If it does please stop kissing my husband. I’ve had an enormous amount of alcohol at this point and I will cry.
Chapter 6: Goose with popcorn and caramelised hazelnuts.
Wine: Côtes du Rhône, Vidal-Fleury, Rhone
Just before they served this I realised how much wine I had consumed and desperately needed to pee. The toilets are very, very high. Well, they seemed that way to me. I spent much time ensuring that I didn’t topple and crack my skull open, such was the immense height of porcelain beast. This also ensured that I missed Chef Martyn’s spiel about this dish, so it was a total taste testing surprise. It was lovely. Yay for goose. It’s always welcome.
Chapter 7: Chocolate avocado textures
Wine: Château de Bealon 5 year. France
My favourite part of any meal: dessert. And they did it so right with chocolate. This was gluten free chocolate with avocado, and it was wonderful. I couldn’t taste the avocado until my final few bites, but others could taste it all along. Also, it was served with the most delicious dessert wine. I am not usually a fan of the dessert wine, I usually feel like it’s too much for my palate to bear. But this was perfect.
Here’s what the table looked like by this point:
So. Much. Wine.
All in all it was a lovely night with some lovely people. If I did do the tasting menu again, I’d probably ask for less wine and more food on the plates. Never thought I’d say that but there it is. The dishes are very small and there’s just no need for an entire glass of wine to accompany each of them, you feel like you’re rushing yourself to finish the wine sometimes because you need the table space. I know I could have just asked the waiter to take away a few half finished glasses, but once you’re under the influence you can’t make those kind of sensible decisions. Also, several people left the restaurant still feeling hungry and searching for something extra to finally fill their alcohol sodden bellies.
I also feel that I was a little more drunk than I was comfortable with by the end, especially considering that I was in an unfamiliar part of town with a tube journey home to contend with. I didn’t drink anything more than the glass with each course that was intended. To be clear, there were no nasty accidents, no one vomited, got naked or treated the rest of us to a show of interpretive dance, but a few of us (the more delicate ones) were a little bit sloppy. I found myself screaming “It happened on Gilmore Girls so it must be true” one too many times, so that’s the level of drunk in case you’re wondering. Maybe a small adjustment of the wine/food balance would take this tasting menu from lovely to perfection.
Here are a few of my lovely table mates:
Please make me feel better about drunkenly annoying them by visiting their blogs – they are all beautiful people with a more comprehensive grasp on reality than I, meaning that their review of this evening will probably make a lot more sense. Check them out:
http://wrapyourlipsaroundthis.com/
http://www.where2dowhat.com/
http://www.thefoodaholic.co.uk/
http://thedailyout.com/
http://wetrykai.wordpress.com/
http://www.TheCutleryChronicles.com/
http://itsnoteasybeinggreedy.com/
http://www.foodgoblin.com/
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