BRAWN: SCRAWNY

There was a very polarised debate recently (on the Guardian Word of Mouth blog I think) about kids in restaurants. I read it disinterestedly because I spend a lot of time in restaurants in London and Spain and I’ve never had a problem.

In the latter country it’s not unusual to see young children eating out with their parents quite late at night. If they’re not eating the parents send the little blighters off to the nearest plaza where they run around until they collapse with exhaustion to be picked up later by mamá y papá . In London, I’ve encountered the odd crying baby at lunchtime but the parents usually just take the sprog for a walk around the block until they stop.

As I said before I’ve never had a problem, but that was until the other night when I visited Brawn, the new sister wine bar/restaurant to Terroirs which brought natural wines to the West End. The whole story is too tedious to go into now but I’d asked the parents of a couple of young children if they would mind keeping them under control.

It was as if I’d just announced to the room that I'm giving the Queen a Pearl necklace for Christmas.

The manager came over to smooth things over but sided with the parents (“We want a relaxed atmosphere here”). When I pointed out that playing hide and seek using tables upon which there were wine glasses and red-hot skillets might not be appropriate he said that they were sensible children. Henceforth I was known as Angry Man.

So a here’s a message to all the Boho parents of Hackney: I’ve got news for you, you feckless, Middle Class twerps. The last time I looked the World was revolving around the Sun, not you and your little lifestyle accessories. If you don’t like it, shove off to Giraffe (which I believe are handily located all over the capital). Now on with the post.

I have a theory about Natural wines that someone, someday will come out and admit it was a big con all along and they’re very sorry for selling us weird, cloudy wines at elevated prices. It’s just a theory of course but Natural wines are very odd. I like them, but then I’m quite odd too.

The more outré examples remind me of Gueuze with that mixture of sourness and natural pétillant character. Others just taste as if they might be off. They do have a freshness to them though that is, well, refreshing and makes them natural partners (see what I did there?) to food, especially charcuterie, terrines and the like.

Which is lucky because that is what Brawn has aplenty on its menu. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the cooked dishes I tried failed to impress (as at Terroirs).

I was hoping for some lightness and balance in my Zander (Pike-Perch) Quenelles with shellfish sauce but the dumplings were rather eggy and heavy and didn’t taste much of the advertised freshwater fish. The sauce had been heavily reduced as well making it too harsh and salty.

A Caillette is a sort of faggot and this one, from Daniel Thierry, a master charcutier from Troyes (which presumably accounts for the price) had a nice, not over-processed texture and tasted fine although I always prefer a stronger offal flavour. The mash that came with the meatball was gluey and overprocessed and needed some butter or cream to enrich it. The carrots were surprisingly good.

Pre-prepped is definitely the way to go at Brawn as bookending the meal were some better plates. The Saucisse Seche and the Salame da Spalmare were excellent., especially the latter (aka Nduja) which is a sort of spicy, spreadable salami. However, with a single Oyster and some waffer-thin slices of parmesan I paid a tenner which seems very mean given the weeny portions.

The Pork Rillette wasn’t bad either: it at least tasted of Pork, which is a promising start, and had the proper meaty/fatty ratio. The texture was a little smooth though as if they’d machine-processed it instead of doing it by hand. I could have done with some toast as well although the bread was a decent sub.

At the other end of the meal was a good Chocolate Mousse although I’m sure this sounds like Mr Damning had just come into the restaurant accompanied by Ms F. Praise.

It does seem to me that places predicated on their wine just can’t get the hang of this cooking lark and so it proved at Brawn. Having said that it’s a pleasant, relaxed place for a drink (especially if you fancy trying Natural wines), its alternative role as E2 community centre notwithstanding, and if you stick to dishes that won’t test the kitchen’s cooking chops too much you should be ok.

TRE VIET: SO SORRY TO HAVE BOTHERED YOU

Ever been to a restaurant and felt like your presence is a bit of an inconvenience? Ever felt like the staff resented you daring to set foot in the place, as if the very act of crossing the threshold was some insult from which they might never quite recover?

It doesn’t happen very often these days, thank God. The current economic climate means that there are lots of people who could take the job of a surly server and the worst I can say about some restaurants recently is that their wait staff have been friendly but clueless.

However, during a recent lunch at Tre Viet, one of the Vietnamese places that dot the length of Mare St in Hackney, it was hard to escape the thought that our choice of their establishment for a meal was all a bit of a faff and that they were hell bent on doing the best they could to get us out of there as quickly as possible so they could return to their own lunch at the only other table where bottoms were touching seats.

We arrived just as they opened and, as HP rightly observed, the lengthy menu should have given us pause. But, we had walked all the way, braving Columbia Road Flower Market en route and deserved at least a decent meal. So,we navigated the plentiful options and soon placed our order.

Fast food is one thing, but it took less than one minute for our first dish to turn up, a cast iron platter of goat meat sizzling along with lemon grass and chilli. It looked harmless enough but its arrival was slightly disconcerting given that we had also ordered four dishes from the section in the menu marked “starters”

Now, I am no expert of Vietnamese culture, but my understanding of the word “starter” is that it implies something to begin the meal and not, as began to happen, the random appearance of dishes at five-second intervals until everything you ordered was on the table at the same time.

More dishes arrived in rapid succession and in no recognisable pattern, including one we didn’t order.

“Yes you did” argued the waitress, looking over her shoulder at the staff table where her soup had been placed and where she would obviously much rather have been.

“No we didn’t I replied” looking at the plate of sesame prawn toast in almost complete certainty that I had not even eaten such a dish since the mid-80’s and certainly would not have been ordering one in a Vietnamese restaurant in Hackney.

She took it away with a sigh and then joined her colleagues, already enjoying their lunch. A great pity then that they were the only ones in the restaurant to be doing so. The roulette delivery system might not have mattered so much had our food been as good as theirs obviously was, but it was patently prepared with as little care and attention as it had been served.

Summer rolls were tired and lacked freshness, beef in betel leaves the same and even the usual fail safe way of gaining DH approval, deep frying did not manage to persuade us to finish a plate of oily frogs legs in enough turmeric to cause a panic in New Market, Calcutta.

Add to this a droopy green papaya salad and the fact that in her rush our waitress brought us plain rice rather than plain rice noodles and our meal took its place as the most dispiriting Vietnamese we have experienced since we last went to Song Que Café on The Kingsland Road.

Twenty-five minutes after arriving, yep a whole twenty-five minutes, we managed to attract the staff’s attention to get the bill of £44. For once, we both decided that we would not leave any tip for service. We never do that usually believing that a bad meal is rarely the fault of the server, but in this case as we had not received any service at all did not feel obliged to acknowledge it. We just left while they continued enjoying their soup and they paid us as little attention as they had during the meal.

I doubt the owners know or care what a bad experience DH had in Tre Viet , but if they do by any chance happen upon this blog can I just say, I am really terribly sorry we disturbed your staff’s lunch.

Don’t worry, it wont be happening again.

ANATOLIA: COME TO ME MY LOVE AT LAST I'VE FOUND YOU

Well, it’s been two long years, but finally DH have found somewhere to at least partly fill the void left by the demise of our favourite Ockabasi de choix, the blessed Angel Mangal.

In that two years we have subject ourselves to plates of charred meat, limp salads and more desiccated testicles than you would find in the archives of The Science Museum. It is fair to say that we were beginning to despair of ever finding anywhere to come close to the superlative platters of flesh offered up by our old chum, Mustapha.

After returning to London from leafy Rotherham in the early morning, unpacking, repacking for L.A and hitting the gym for a much needed workout, I was not in the mood for leftovers and certainly not in the mood to cook.

So, with HP, who needed little persuading, in tow, we headed out to Hackney, Mare St to be more precise and a small place that had been on our list for some time, Anatolia.

But first, of course, a pre-supper pint or two, in this case served up with considerable charm at The Pembury Tavern, a cavernous pub on Amhurst St that serves some of the very best real ale in London and definitely the best pork scratchings. What the pub lacks in ambience, it makes up for in the quality of its beer and two assorted pints each from Milton Brewery in Cambridgeshire, fortified us against the cold night air and for the short walk back to Anatolia.

It’s pleasingly canteen like and the grill was in full flame with someone else’s supper as we took a table and looked at the short menu. There is never much to be discussed for DH when it comes to Turkish grilling and, alongside a few starters, our mixed grill with a side order of quail was soon sizzling away atop the hot coals.

Starters were sizable and better than most with Ispanak, Tarama and Patlican, scooped up with warm flat bread, distracting us until our equally sizable platter of grilled goodies was placed before us with a side plate of salad and bowls of garlic and chilli sauce.

The grilling was spot on, with the juices still bubbling happily on our first bites of lamb chop and, like all good purveyors of grilled meats, they were not backward with the salt without which all the flavour stays locked inside its fleshy prison. Adana were suitably spicy and the lamb ribs benefited from a long strip of fat to keep the meat moist.

It wasn’t quite Angel Mangal, the addition of dry slices from the revolving doner in the take-away section added little and the single sweetbread and lambs testicle, while very tasty indeed, merely left us both wishing we had placed an order for a side dish of them. But, these are minor complaints for one of the best flesh fests you will find without googling “collegeamateurs.com” and at £40 including service and a charge of £3.50 for corkage on a bottle of Spanish something or other, very good value indeed.

We still haven’t forgotten Mustapha, but we’ll definitely be going back to Anatolia and very probably to The Pembury Tavern beforehand.

PHO SWEET BASIL: NOT AT ALL FAULTY

Sometimes the old taste buds become a bit jaded and need something to perk them up a bit. For Dos Hermanos that’s where having a few Vietnamese restaurants in the nabe comes in handy. Our original plan had been to visit one on Mare Street but the torrential rain weakened our resolve and found us traipsing up and down Kingsland Road waiting for somewhere (anywhere) to open. The people inside Pho Sweet Basil saw us looking at the menu and, contrary to our usual experiences, smiled and immediately flipped the sign on the door from Closed to Open, so it would have been rude of us not to have entered.

Like many of the Vietnamese joints on this strip Pho Sweet Basil is more cafe style than restaurant and if you've visited any of its neighbours the menu will be pretty familiar as well: a mixture of Vietnamese dishes with a fair smattering of Chinese thrown into the mix. We stuck to the Vietnamese starters with a couple of more substantial dishes. We had fancied the Green Papaya salad a regular in many places but they were out of Green Papaya, a bit odd given that the number of ethnic greengrocers dotted around. Our second choice, Mango Salad, drew a blank as well.

What was available wasn't bad though. Summer Rolls had a slightly thick covering but were fresh tasting. Soft Shell Crab had a rather thick batter and came in a gloopy tamarind sauce but tasted good. Marinated beef came wrapped in Betel leaves for further wrapping in Lettuce with Rice Vermicelli, Mint and a nice dipping sauce and was rather nice. Another DIY roll was some decent prawns with more of that vermicelli and some basil leaves. Best of all though, were the frog's legs which came in a light crunchy batter that was well seasoned with a good chilli kick. Better, I think, than those we had at Le Bouchon Breton the other night.

Pho had a rather lightweight stock – although HS tells me this is echt - but the promised rare beef wasn't and there were only a few pieces scattered around. Disappointing. Another dish of Lamb came with even more of the Rice Vermicelli (can you see a pattern here). Like the beef in our soup the lamb wasn't very impressive and only a few overcooked slivers nestled amongst the noodles.

We'd also ordered a dish of Catfish Hotpot which was the staff had forgotten about. Luckily for us as we were stuffed. With only a couple of soft drinks and a couple of beers we somehow spent almost £50 including service which seemed a bit expensive but then we'd ordered like greedy guts (yes, really),so maybe normal people would find it more reasonable.

If you’re after the less run-of-the-mill main course specialities then one of the other nearby restaurants may be more suitable but if you’re happy to stick with the starters and a few beers then Pho Sweet Basil should do the trick. It did for us, anyway.

RAIZES: HACKNEY ROAD BRAZILIAN

I should get this out of the way.

On my recent trip, I had a bleeding awful time in Brazil. I was pinned to a wall by a gun toting airport security guard, I was bitten to buggery by bed bugs in my Salvador guesthouse, I had three attempts to pick my pocket within hours of arriving and, as I tried to fit in one last meal of Sushi in Sao Paolo’s huge Japanese enclave, I was deposited instead at a dingy shopping centre half an hour from the airport. As my plane took off for San Francisco, I leant over my fellow passenger and gave Brazil an internationally recognised finger extension through the window.

Nearly a year later and the horrific memories have faded somewhat and, with promises from my Brazilian friends that they would accompany me next time, I have even pondered on adding Brazil to my future travel plans. Top amongst these friends is my dear chum, Claudia who, when she heard about my adventures put her head in her hands for a good ten minutes. I hoped it was out of shame for her countrymen’s behaviour, but when I heard the slow sobs escaping between her fingers, I realised it was because she was actually laughing her tits off. Never mind.

Which brings us to today’s lunch at Raizes, a café in the Hackney Road, already a hub of the Capital’s ever expanding Brazilian community. Claudia eats there every week and thought it was a good venue for me to treat her to a little birthday lunch. The menu is lengthy with snacks, small plates and huge main course portions to be washed down with cocktails, fresh juices and imported Brazilian beers.

Starter plates of Bolinho de Bacalhau and Coxinha are evidence of Brazil’s Portuguese heritage and were too much for us to finish in anticipation of large main courses. Claudia thought that they had probably been brought in from outside rather than made in house. A plate of Mandioca Frita, deep fried cassava merely confirmed my thoughts when presented with a plate of cassava chips during a recent meal at The Modern Pantry. There are few things you can do with cassava. Deep-frying is not one of them.

Main courses were substantial and much better. Claudia’s Feijoada was a good example of the classic slave stew, plumped out with large chunks of pork, sausage and black beans in a sauce deeply flavoured with garlic. The ferofa, more cassava, had been fried with more garlic and onions, but tasted stale.

My own main course was another challenging plateful of meat, this time rib-eye of beef cooked down with, yep, you guessed it, cassava. Although the meat was a little chewy, it repaid the effort by releasing good beefy juices, which I mixed with boiled rice to good effect.

The highlight of the meal came in the form of freshly made juices and from a wide list we chose glasses of cashew nut, passion fruit and cupuacu, all excellent and bringing the bill to £30 including tip, which is not over the top considering that supper is now a physical impossibility.

Like the country, there is little finesse to Brazilian food and, also like the country, it is not that lovely to look at ( at least what I saw of it) but, it is hearty and generous and, particularly in the company of someone like Claudia, I might just be tempted to give them both another go.