Ethos

Quick Review

Ethos

48 Eastcastle St, 

Fitzrovia, 

London 

W1W 8DX

Phone: 020 3581 1538

Website: http://ethosfoods.com

Split the Bill paid an on the spur of the moment visit to the new veggie restaurant just off Oxford street - Ethos.  There are plenty of eateries around this bit of Fitzrovia but this one has a rather different feel.  The decor is whitewashed walls and multi-level tables and chairs, booths and pedestals of food.  The vista is punctuated with a birch wood that has been incorporated into the centre of the space.

Foodwise - it's a rather marvellous buffet of veggie gems all on display at the right temperature and with enticing labels - simply pick up a plate or bowl, load it up and go get it weighed and paid.

SN: The process of choosing is in truth the hardest bit only because of the mouth-watering dishes  before you.  As you spin round the tables you also get scents and sights that you bookmark for return on a subsequent course or indeed day. The meal is entirely your own making.

I loved it and had far too much first time round - and second time round and then had a lovely slice of pecan pie.  I think I spent around £25 - but I ate like a king.

Our Petit Chablis was very reasonable £28 though it needed 20 minutes of breathing to lose its edge

SN: I'd particularly recommend the BBQ "spare ribs" which are actually wheat gluten, the "Scotch eggs" made with aloo coating and perhaps most memorable in joint first place (though I didn't try everything) the Courgette with Feta - which was light and delicate but not lacking taste and the Risotto balls - crispy on the outside and mouth watering on the inside.

LM: The dishes are sensibly arranged in a suggestion of what would pair well together but I largely ignored this in favour of heaping my plate. Particular favourites for me were a beautifully marinated aubergine steak and the aforementioned courgette and feta salad - the quality of the ingredients they use is clear. Sadly I didn't have room for dessert but the selection of cakes, pies and pastries looked appetising. They also have an 'all you can eat' brunch option on weekends with or without booze which I can imagine being great fun (and enough calories for a weekend!)

The real beauty of this concept of course is that it encourages you to try new things - as it happened I didn't enjoy the BBQ seitan ribs but as I only had one it was no loss. The only downside was that on occasion when certain dishes ran out they weren't replaced very quickly so you can end up missing dishes you want to try (or repeat)




We may return sooner than we would to any other venue - not least because although there were queues at 8pm at 6:30 it was easy to get a table.

As long as they continue to use good quality, fresh ingredients it's hard to see how Ethos won't be a roaring success. Get in while they've still got space!

Rabot 1745

Rabot 1745

2 - 4 Bedale Street, 

Borough Market, 

London 

SE1 9AL

020 7378 8226

http://www.hotelchocolat.com/uk/restaurants/locations/rabot-1745

Rabot 1745 sits in that maze of lanes which form Borough Market, not far from London Bridge - indeed as we sat the distant rumble of trains added a cosmopolitan air to proceedings.  It is a restaurant based, or themed if you like, on cacao - roasted on site and in every dish and some of the drinks. Set up by the founders of Hotel Chocolat and based on a Plantation House interior, Its sister restaurant sits on the Rabot plantation in St Lucia.  Chef Jon Bentham takes a light touch with the cacao on various types of dishes including typically English cuisine

There is a bar downstairs which is notably more agricultural in decor than upstairs.  The upstairs has two halves - an open balcony under cover of the market roof and overlooking the market stalls.  The night-time vista is somewhat barren as all the stalls are packed up.  The other half is under a ceiling - sparsely decorated and fresh with repeating patterns of lampshades, wall coverings and some art high on the walls.  The toilets are delineated with a wall made of strips of wood - high quality tessellation - OCD joy

We thought we should dive into the Cacao Gin and Tonic given cacao was everywhere - and very pleasing it was too.  The little bowl of roasted cacao pods on the table gives one a vivid feeling of the provenance of this taste - this is distant, tropical food brought into a very different setting mediated by the authentic decor.  The gin carries the cacao taste beautifully and was perhaps the peerless combination of the night.

LM: Roast fig, soft goat's cheese, walnut-honey-cacao balsamic was a gorgeous starter, light and creamy with enough dressing to balance the large amount of cheese. The cacao was nicely punchy without overwhelming the other flavours - a good start.

SN: My first course (there was no bread - shock horror) was Yorkshire pudding filled with rare seared parkin-spiced beef, white chocolate mash, cacao red wine gravy. This is a sweet/savoury dish which wins especially because the beef (properly rare) is a sweet highlight in the mix.  The spice mix is beautifully subtle and the heft comes from the delicious gravy.  The Yorkshire pudding adds a weight to this dish as does the milky-sweet potato.  It could have been done without either but I'd be reluctant to do without both.

I decided to go light on the wine so we took a favourite grape from a wide ranging and well priced wine list - Gewurtztraminer, Domaine Ostertag Vignoble d'E 2009  a much better match for Louise but a lovely between courses sip for me.  There was a never-ending supply of iced water for the table too.




SN: My main course was a Slow braised cacao glazed lamb shoulder, garlic mash, buttered carrots another stalwart of the British table given the cacao treatment.

Maybe I have a palette that doesn't respond to these things but garlic mash never really hits the heights for me.  This substantial dish was beautifully delivered but lacked something to cut through some of the richness - a red wine would have helped me in retrospect but I think there needs to be something on the very well loaded plate.  The carrots were very nice but hardly a radical offering.  The lamb was very lean and fell apart at the merest glance.  The glazing worked well but this dish missed a counterpoint for me - maybe the garlic was intended to do that - it didn't come through.  So if you have it - order a characterful red wine.





We shared a dish of Roast kohlrabi, onions, almond cream which was delicious

LM: West Indian vegetable curry tasting platter was something seriously special: Sweet potato and cauliflower gobi, spiced lentil dhal, cumin-spiced roast aubergines, cacao-nib rice. The portions were sensible which is where I often fall down on Indian food and the spicing was just right, nice and warming and full of flavour without blowing my head off, The aubergine in particular was fantastic, melt in the mouth tender, and the spikes of cacao in the rice added a different dimension.




SN: If my main course hadn't hit me between the eyes with cacao in every mouthful - the dessert certainly did.  The Rabot 1745 Mousse Collection: Trinidad 68% milk with malt brittle, Saint Lucia 78% dark with toasted nut crumble, Ecuador 90% dark with roasted nibs - to be precise was something of an affirmation for me that the subtle nuances of cacao are many and well worth exploring.  This though a very rich dessert and is best approached after a substantial break I think.  As a fan of very dark chocolate latterly there was nothing here which was overly bitter for me but the Ecuadorian offer my test the limits for some.  The toppings didn't really penetrate the body of the dish and so were fleeting glimpses of taste combinations one might try elsewhere. 

Molten chocolate lava pudding made from the cacao beans here on site, Rabot 1745 ice cream was everything you'd hope it would be. The famous Hotel Chocolat chocolate is every bit as good melted as solid, encased with a light chocolate sponge and a caramel (I think) ice cream - nothing earth shattering but bloody delicious.
 

We finished with Madeira and I also had a Jamaican Brandy which was served with cacao nibs and 74% St Lucia dark chocolate.

Its certainly an enjoyable dining experience at Rabot 1745 but for anyone like me who is not a cacao fanatic I'm not sure I feel the need to rush back.  I certainly commend it as a fascinating place to go and try something different and perhaps importantly have a satisfying meal both in quality and quantity.

LM: There are maybe a couple of small changes they could make - no slimline tonic at the bar was surprising given that they had several gin options, and I would have loved to have seen a complimentary bread basket - it is noticeable when restaurants don't offer it. Nonetheless it's far from gimmicky as one might assume and well worth a visit.