Salt Yard
54 Goodge St,
London
W1T 4NA
+44 20 7637 0657
Salt Yard is part of a chain - though you wouldn't think it. It is in the heart of Fitzrovia near Goodge Street Tube station and sits a 100 yards or so off Tottenham Court Road.
The area is awash with bars, cafes and restaurants and I admit had I gone down Goodge Street uninformed there isn't much that would make you pick Salt Yard out of the line-up, except that the view from the path is intriguing.
Before Salt Yard we popped into the London Cocktail Club across the road for a quick drink. Fascinating decor, friendly service and lethally strong cocktails - good start to the evening. It's a proper hideaway - well impressed with the atmosphere & decor (such as it is). We sat in a booth kitted out with an old fashioned telephone and copious graffiti and drank cocktails with gin, fig and absinthe in them.
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| London Cocktail Club: Exhibit I |
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| London Cocktail Club: Exhibit II |
SALT YARD!
LM: One of the first things I noticed when we went into Salt Yard was the front of house service; a couple arrived just ahead of us and were shown to their table but immediately another member of staff came over to seat us. It was a good start and the service just got better.
The menu is divided into 'Charcuterie and Bar snacks' and then for the tapas, 'meat' 'fish' and 'vegetables'. I tend to steer away from tapas because from experience I end up spending an evening eating tortilla and patatas bravas; no such risk here. Our waiter was happy to advise on options, and as soon as he twigged I was a veggie offered the special without meat.
We started with country bread, warm and fluffy with a buttery finish, and aoili. My love of good bread is no secret to anyone who knows me; this was right up there with my favourites (second only to the bread board at Viajante). I could have eaten a whole meal of this stuff. Nocellara de Belice olives were juicy and bordering on buttery - divine.
SN: it was a nice change to see a choice of breads too. It may be a bit of a digression but why don't we eat bread and aoili more? It seems to me an ideal snack and we're rarely offered it in restaurants as a starter - surely it's not because we still juvenile worries about the smell of garlic? GOOD aioli is divine and with pasta its a meal in itself. As for the olives they were divine too - with no indication of the CoO its impossible to say under which sun they were ripened but I'd like to think it was their native Sicily. But the restaurant had us at hello - important because of the disasters at Moti Mahal but also because thereafter choices become a confident exploration of a wondrous garden, not a journey through a minefield. To accompany it we had a glass of Oloroso Seco, Don Nuno, Lustau - nutty enough to go with this basic fare. We were set fair.
As I was saying - the restaurant sets the mood for a guided exploration (it's not unknow territory for the most part but it encourages curiosity. So despite a host of good well known wines from Spain and elsewhere I went for a wine I didn't know but though it might suit our various preferences. Fagus, Coto de Hayas, Aragonesas (Garnacha, Aragon 2009) - mispelled on the wine list - turned out to be a thing of fortitude and some beauty - a huge fruity bouquet which sets up a very mellow and nothing like as powerful in taste. For me it was the kind of robust wine that tapas needs - sweet enough to compliment the food but not so strong as to overpower it. I think generally restaurants find good wines nowadays seldom have I had a shack. But this one was interesting and new and a delight - I might buy a bottle or two for rainy summer days.
Let the tapas begin!
LM: My first dish was a deep fried courgette flower with goats cheese and honey. The photo really doesn't do it justice; the courgette was firm and fresh on the inside, the batter light and crispy. I could have eaten it several times over. Our waiter was fantastic at recommending dishes; as soon as he realised I was vegetarian he also offered to adapt one of the specials of the day without meat but I was too smitten with the other menu options.
Next up for the veggie, a salad of beetroot, onions, hazelnuts and goats curd. Simple ingredients but well cooked; the onion and beetroot were tender but still had bite, and there was the perfect amount of curd to balance out the sharpness.
SN: I think it's worth a close up of this salad - the colours and textures engage the eye before the tongue and the taste. The taste matched the looks.
LM: Somehow we forgot (SN: I forgot) to photograph the patatas bravas which is a shame; they bore no resemblance to the tired chunks of potato in radioactive tomato sauce seen in most chains. Beautifully spiced and served with aoili and bravas sauce on the side we munched our way through two large portions.
SN: My choices were Slow Cooked Pork Cheeks with Prunes, Oloroso Sherry and Celeriac Purée and Slow Cooked Octopus, Ratte Potatoes, Lemon, Chilli and Capers - it was a night for slow cooked everything....
The Pork was a rich slow cooked small fist of meat floating on a cloud of the most delicate puree, the texture of shaving foam (OK, that analogy may not be of not a great help) but not so light that the meat is either overwhelmed taste-wise nor sunk under the laws of gravity. When pork is so rich the edge of an Oloroso is to be welcomed and I think the prunes take the direction a tad sweeter too. But the soft buttery flavour and consistency of the celeriac brings us back to the savoury - a handsome journey of four tastes each in it's place.
I should also say - the dishes are Salt yard are not small - but I guess the hearty eater will need 3 or 4 but they are good value
My second dish was different again.
The octopus showed no sign of rubberiness or indeed having lost any taste as a result of its long preparation. The potato was gorgeous and despite herbs and spices and buttery sauces - the whole thing wasn't too hard to digest. A refined dish against the pork cheek and the deeply satisfying cephalopdian bites were like nuggets on the plate.
A first!
SN: For the first time in our long relationship Louise decided that dessert was going to be the centre of her dining and so we shared the pudding Cold Chocolate Fondant with Turron Caramel and Crème Fraiche Ice Cream. It would have struggled to justify it but I'm so glad I joined in for two reasons. The Fondent ice cream wasn't too sweet and the fondant was firm enough to ……… no, its no good. The pudding was lovely but the Pedro Ximenez was just divine and I'm sure contained enough calories to be a meal in its self. It was like drinking a tot of Evian that had been lightly flavoured with the juice of a kilo of raisins and a quart of vodka…but that's way too crude to describe this huge wine. Maybe overly sweet for many, but boy what a corker Pedro Ximenez, Fernando de Castilla. I had too. After which the coffee was well met. Maybe Lou remembers the dessert…..
LM: Dessert was a wonderful cold chocolate fondant with turron caramel and creme fraiche ice-cream. The dictionary definition of indulgent, the fondant oozed out and mixed with the caramel…within around thirty seconds of the photo being taken the plate was empty. Creme fraiche ice-cream was a great idea as well; subtle but with enough body to cut through the sweet chocolate and caramel.
LM: It's worth mentioning that the amazing service and food here wasn't a one off; more recently I went to sister restaurant Opera Tavern in Covent
Garden, where the veggie options were different but the service,
cooking and presentation were equally wonderful; clearly a team who
knows what they're doing.
SN: In summary this was the kind of tapas to which I could get accustomed. Varied, tasty, not to greasy, not too heavy and full of light and sweet delights from the olives to the creme fraiche ice cream. More notable and enjoyable and atypical was the quality of the service - helpful, alert and very personable. Our waiter was a delight and worth so much in a Soho eatery especially after I'd endured Moti Mahal and Cinnamon Soho's rubbish service recently. Its worth an adventure at around £50 each - explore the sherry and wine, explore the veggie tapas and the delightful side lights to these filling and satisfying dishes.
