Osh Restaurant – Outstanding Uzbekistani Cooking & One of The Best London Meals of 2018!

Name: Osh Restaurant

Where: 14-15 Beauchamp Place, Knightsbridge, SW3 1NQ, https://oshrestaurant.com/

Cost: A 3-course meal at Osh costs on average £35 per person not including beverages or service. Small eats cost £6-14, main courses are £11 to £29, and desserts are £4.50 to £7. 

About: Opened in March 2018 in Knightsbridge's plush Beauchamp Place, on the site of the former Japanese Nozumi restaurant, Osh Restaurant serves Uzbekistani and Central Asian food.

Aiming to offer authentic Uzbekistani dining, the management has hired and brought to the UK a number of Uzbekistani chefs. Osh imports its vegetables and fruit from Uzbekistan twice a week, a selection of which, is on proud display at the entrance, along with dates, nuts and seeds.

Osh Restaurant and Bar is spread over three floors of a Knightsbridge townhouse, with the ground floor restaurant being set under a glass roof with a view of the verdant trees above. 

This part of the restaurant is decorated in neutral creams and browns and overlooks the blue and cream tiled, open plan kitchen and tandoor ovens, while the upper floor is decked out in gold and red stripes with beautiful artwork.

The restaurant's concept is of sharing dishes, with platters placed in the middle of the table.  Oddly, there is a selection of Asian and Japanese inspired dishes on the menu (run-of-the-mill items like black cod in miso and sashimi in ponzu dressing etc), but we chose to focus, with the guidance of our very knowledgeable waiter Nikolai, on the Uzbek dishes.

Osh takes its name from Uzbekistan’s national dish. Osh or Plov, is the restaurant’s signature dish and cost as little as £16 for 2 people to share. Nikolai tells us that 99% of diners will order this plus a couple or few other small dishes. Osh is an intricate rice dish of slow braised mutton, in rice, garlic, chickpeas, grated carrots and sultanas. Osh is one of the most wonderful things I have eaten this year.

Uzbekistan is also known for its fine caviar, and guests with deep enough pockets can choose from a range of beluga, oscietra and platinum caviars, starting at £60 for 30g.

What We Ate: Uzbek tomato carpaccio with goats cheese and a scattering of pomegranate seeds (£8) tasted as good as it looked, with ultra-fine slices of ripe tomato. The cheese was creamy and rich with a lovely gamey quality to it.

The warm aubergine salad with goat's cheese and coriander dressing was beautifully presented with a topping of deep-fried leeks (£8). The aubergine chunks had been lightly battered and deep-fried, and combined deliciously with the goats cheese. Nikolai says this is the most popular of all starters and I can certainly see why!

The aubergine salad came served with some wonderfully aromatic, freshly-baked Uzbek bread seasoned with caraway seeds, and tarragon butter (£3.50).

Butternut squash Manti were sweet and delicious dumplings, flavoured with coriander and cumin (£5), served with a little pot of refreshing sour cream.

Uzbek Chebureki were deep-fried dough parcels of minced lamb with Uzbek spices (£6) – they were light, oil-free and delicious with the fresh tomato herb relish.

Surmi cabbage rolls (£12) were filled with minced rabbit, rice and topped with truffle shavings. They were exceptionally good - perfectly tender, aromatic and creamy. The accompanying sauce of butter, white wine and fennel was bursting with flavour.

Shashlik are grilled skewers of meat or fish marinated for 12 hours - are served at Osh Restaurant with spicy cucumber salad, adjika sauce of tomatoes, chillies, onions and red pepper, and flat bread.

The chicken spatchcock shashlik (£11) with ginger, chilli, garlic and tomato was succulent and aromatic.

The beef fillet shashlik (£14) came with soy sauce, honey, garlic and onion. It was tender, served medium rare but with a delicious caramelisation, and well seasoned. I cannot understand who Osh can serve such generous and good quality meat skewers for £14.

Uzbek Osh is a variant of the plov lamb dishes popular in central Asia - a warming mixture of lamb or mutton, onions, grated carrots and spices.  Osh's version had slow cooked lamb served with orange and yellow carrots, peppers, chickpeas, lamb lard, sultanas, pilau rice and Uzbek spices.

Served with Achichuk (Uzbek tomato) salad and Uzbek radish salad (£16 for 2). This was also remarkably good, with aromas of cumin and coriander.

For dessert, we shared a pistachio éclair with fresh blackcurrants, blueberries and raspberries, with micro mint (£7). This was magnificent, the éclair richly almond flavoured, the crème patisserie aromatic with vanilla and heady pistachio.

What We Drank: Osh has a comprehensive cocktail list. We started with a Desert Tea cocktail (£14), with Courvoisier VSOP cognac, mint, rose essence, red sandalwood and red amaranth. This was strong, intensely perfumed, and delicious.  The Silk Spritz (£14) was a refreshing blend of Elix vodka, Italicus Rosolio di Bergamotto, Thai basil, kumquat, Martini Prosecco Brut.

The entry level white is a Musar Jeune from Chateau Musar, Lebanon at £55, while the red is a Piedmontese Barbera at £35. There is a good selection of wine by the glass, including a Cretan white at £9, and the Barbera is also served by the glass at £6.75.

Likes: I enjoyed absolutely every item we chose from the menu, and this was one of those very rare meals without any weak dishes (I would like to thank Nikolai for his help ghiding us to choose the best Uzbek dishes). Despite the plush location and restaurant decor, the food menu is outstandingly good value for money. A perfect meal for me at Osh includes – Warm Aubergine Salad + Surmi Cabbage Rolls + Beef Fillet Shashlik Skewer + Osh Lamb Rice!

Dislikes: None

Verdict: For Uzbekistani cooking that is authentic, delicious and generous in plush Knightsbridge and at surprisingly reasonable prices, there can surely be nowhere better in London. I had one of the best meals of 2018 at Osh Restaurant. Very highly recommended.

Zuma - Celebrating 15 Years of Exquisite Japanese Cooking in London

Words and Photography by Greg Klerkx and Luiz Hara

In the jungle of London’s hyper-competitive restaurant market, claims to be the best of the best are as common as threats of a Tube strike. Few enough restaurants can make this claim in the first place with any hope for consensus; those that make the whispered short-list – ‘one of the best in the city’ – rarely stay there, whether done in by hubris, transient talent or just changing times.

It’s all the more remarkable, then, that Knightsbridge stalwart Zuma finds itself celebrating 15 years in business still among that happy few at the top of the pack. Pick your blog or guide; pick your year of review. There you’ll find Zuma, unwavering in its place as the go-to spot for inventively Japanese cuisine.

That’s something worth celebrating and we recently did just that at the invitation of Zuma’s founder Rainer Becker and his team, who’ve put together a 15-year tasting menu – an exclusive collection of the most iconic dishes from the past decade and a half.

Spoiler alert: there was absolutely nothing on this menu that was anything less than delicious. Not a duff note when it came to presentation, creativity or flavour. That makes for a potentially dull review, so we’ll work the thesaurus hard to find creative superlatives to describe what crossed our table.

First, like London buses, came a trio of starters. Suzuki no sashimi (thinly sliced sea bass with yuzu, truffle oil, and salmon roe) was so delicate that it practically levitated off its dish, the nearly translucent sea bass held in gravity’s check by a fine balance of tangy yuzu and earthy truffle oil. The salmon roe added that touch of the sea, and not a little complication to the balance, yet not a flavour was out of place.

The second dish, chu toro no osasshimi kousou fuumi (thinly sliced semi fatty tuna, chilli, coriander and sesame), was something like the sea bass’s cheekier cousin; the flavours turned up a notch, the spark of chilli held in check by aromatic coriander and sesame. It was almost a relief to tuck into the hourensou no goma ae (steamed spinach with sesame sauce), which hit our tastebuds like an earthy palate cleanser.

All three starters paired nicely with the Billecart-Salmon Brut Reserve NV, slightly flinty but with a long finish that cradled each of our starters with loving care.

Next arrived a favourite dish of the afternoon, and how could it not be? Wagyu no tataki, kuro toryufu ponzu gake (freshly seared wagyu sirloin tataki with black truffle ponzu) was every bit as unctuous and complex as its long title suggests, the black truffle ponzu – a palate-dazzler all on its own – bringing out the wagyu’s notes of summer grass and, well, pampering. We had the thought that if an Earth-annihilating meteor struck at that very moment, this would be a fine dish to go out on.

As with the starting trio, the wagyu/truffle juggernaut was accompanied by a simpler, more restrained dish, in this case piri kara dofu to abokado salada (fried tofu with avocado and Japanese herbs). The Wieninger ‘Wiener Gemischter Satz 2015, an Austrian speciality a-brim with gorgeous grapefruit and stone fruit yet with sufficient acidity to ensure it wraps nicely around the decadent flavours and textures of the wagyu.

Zuma wisely shifted gears at this point in the menu, offering a selection of nigiri sushi, premium sashimi and ‘chef special’ maki rolls, all made to the high standard of everything that’d come before. This beautifully presented array was paired with Kimura Junmai Ginjo, a clear, crisp sake hailing from one of Japan’s most venerable producers. Taken alone, this combination would have made us happy at most other Japanese restaurants in the city.

Our final three savoury dishes felt like the last burst of fireworks at an epic Guy Fawkes display, where what’s left in the arsenal is lobbed into the sky in one, spectacular go, the intention to dazzle and amuse. Ainame no koumi yaki to kousou (grilled Chilean sea bass with green chilli, ginger dressing) and gyuhire sumbibiyaki karami zuke (spicy beef tenderloin with sesame, red chilli and sweet soy) seemed like a reprise of our first course, with that much more body, depth and punch. 

The straight man in this lively trio was shitake no ninniku fuumi (shitake mushroom with garlic and soy butter), so deep and flavourful it was practically another meat dish. Castello di Albola Chianti Classico Riserva 2013 made for a snappy, peppery match across all three dishes. It was a marvellous display, and we felt somewhat bereft that it was finished.

Becker surely anticipated such a let down, because the real sky blossom was still to come. Describing our pudding as merely ‘Deluxe Dessert Platter’ is somewhat like calling Big Ben a clock. Our recommendation is to savour the photo here, though you unfortunately won’t be able to savour the mango and raspberry sorbets, the carmelised banana cake, or the variety of tunnel-dark chocolate offerings; ganache and fondant and more. It was a symphony of sweetness in a playful suit, matched with Yume no yado, Yuzu shu, a cheeky, sharp sake reprising the yuzu notes we began with.

It’s hard to know what else to say about Zuma at 15, except perhaps the obvious: here’s to at least 15 more years of inventive, precise, exquisite Japanese cuisine.

The ‘BB’ Burger at Bar Boulud Knightsbridge

Words & Photography by Marina Benjamin and Luiz Hara

Name: Bar Boulud

Where: Mandarin Oriental, Hyde Park, 56 Knightsbridge, London DW1X 7LA, http://www.barboulud.com/london

Cost: Starters range from fish soups to salads and are priced from £9-19 while sharing boards of charcuterie start at £30. Mains are a selection of bistro dishes (£9-£34) and desserts (£6-12) are modern inflections of French classics. The Menu Buchon (working lunch) is good value, with 2 and 3 courses for £18 and £21 respectively.

About: Bar Boulud occupies a swish street facing location on the ground floor of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. At lunchtimes, a crowd of tourists and shoppers, business folk and families, pours through the giant front doors, making for a bustling brasserie atmosphere within. 

The wait staff is completely professional yet an informal mood prevails, which is all the better to eat with. You won’t find the haughty pretentious of haute cuisine here - instead the restaurant gets on with feeding people delicious and hearty food that hails from provincial France; the steaks might come with chimichurri; the burgers with green chilli mayo; and the fries arrive, thin, crisp and moreish, in paper cones that sit in metal tins.

There is a sense of fun about Bar Boulud, where playful snacky additions top and tail the menu, from cheesy puffs made of gruyère-infused choux pastry at one end, to truffles textured with puffed rice at the other. And the drinking can verge on frivolity: there is a Gin menu that stands on its own and boasts not only gins flavoured with saffron, but tonics tinged with elderflower, cardamom, watermelon or lemongrass. Every now and then, depending on who’s visiting, or indeed, on a whim, the sommelier might decide to open a 6 litre Imperiale of wine and treat lucky diners to extraordinary vintages from Bordeaux or the Rhone Valley at a fraction of what they’d normally cost.

What We Had: We came with one goal in mind: The London Foodie’s ongoing appreciation of the top-notch burger. Yet having travelled through London on an unseasonably warm day, cross-town from meetings elsewhere, we were hungry enough to be tempted by the aforementioned gougères (£5), and a zingy starter of gravlax (£12) – delectable slices of salmon cured in gin but curiously missing the usual dill borders.

I love a restaurant that takes pride in its bread, and Bar Boulud gets extra points on this count, because it serves pointy sheaves of well-textured baguette with exquisite pats of creamy butter, salted just right.  If you’re not careful you could fill up on bread alone. Or even better, bread washed down with a glass of the Francois Monay house Champagne, sold at a very reasonable £12.95 a glass.

The burgers, when they came, brought a whiff of Americana with them. Sitting in regal solitude on their rectangular white plates the char-grilled patties looked fit to bust out of their buns, in explosions of generous demi-rare redness, juicy and properly textured in a visibly granular way. 

Bar Boulud offers just three kinds of burger: The Yankee (£17), which consists of 8oz of prime British ground beef, minimally accompanied by staples from the vegetable crisper drawer – lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle. Cheese is optional. I opted to have it, but was a little disappointed that it had congealed on the way to our table and wasn’t the hot and molten sludge I’d been anticipating. The meat, however, was faultless; soft enough to adhere, but grainy enough to fall apart at the merest contact with tooth. And packed with flavour too.

Other options include The Piggie (£19), topped with barbecued pork, jalapeno mayo and cabbage, and served in a cheddar bun; and the ‘BB’, priced at a royal £24. This stunning confection of patty, foie gras and short ribs stuffed into a black onion seed bun with a slick of horseradish mayo, could challenge the healthiest of appetites. My dining buddy claimed his ‘BB’ was sublime and symphonious, and neither of us left a crumb on our plates.

It just so happened that the day before we visited, the sommelier had opened an Imperiale of Chateaux Clos Marsalette Bordeaux (2013). It was smooth as you like, and dreamy with warm red fruit tastes and aromas. This was available at £16 a glass, but you can also enjoy a 125ml glass of Barons de Rothschild Legende de Lafite at Bar Boulud for just £5.90.

Likes: Scrumptious burgers that set a bar for others to follow, and the best bread and butter in town. The Chateaux Clos Marsalette Bordeaux wine was exceptional.

Dislikes: I’d like to see a range of condiments offered with the burgers, mustards and relishes that you can add on and play with. This, it seems to me, would be in the spirit of friendly build-your-own dining that Bar Boulud cultivates so well.

Verdict: Bar Boulud is a great lunch spot in the heart of Knightsbridge – writing this, I can’t think of much else I’d rather have right now than their BB Burger & frites with a glass of Chateaux Clos Marsalette, perfection! Recommended.

San Pellegrino's 'Live in Italian' Dinners by Four of London's Best Chefs at Harvey Nichols

This summer from the 10th July to the 7th August 2016, San Pellegrino will be hosting four dinners themed ‘Live in Italian’ at Harvey Nichols Fifth Floor, which will be transformed into an Italian alfresco terrace for the occasions.

Resident ‘Live in Italian’ chefs Ollie Dabbous of Dabbous, Theo Randall of Theo Randall, James Lowe of Lyles and Alyn Williams of The Westbury will each host every Tuesday of the takeover. The chefs will create a 4-course menu with Italian influence, accompanied by S.Pellegrino and Italian wines.

Tickets for the S. Pellegrino ‘Live in Italian’ dinners cost £40 (plus £2 booking fee) per person and can be purchased online at https://billetto.co.uk/en/events/spellegrino-presents-live-in-italian. This is the line up:

12th July, 7pm: Ollie Dabbous (7pm)

This is the one I signed up to, so do say hello if you come to this! 

Ollie Dabbous: The founder of Fitzrovia’s celebrated Dabbous, Ollie Dabbous, will bring his innovative take on modern European cuisine and unique style to the S.Pellegrino ‘Live in Italian’ Terrace on the 12th July at Harvey Nichols Fifth Floor. 

19th July, 7pm: Theo Randall

Theo Randall: Naming Italy ‘his favourite place to eat in the world,’ and renowned for his simple, rustic, Italian cuisine, Theo Randall will bring his relaxed approach to fine dining to the occasion.

26th July, 7pm: James Lowe

James Lowe: On Tuesday 26th July Lyles’ James Lowe will bring his focus on quality ingredients, charming service and love for entertaining to Harvey Nichols to remind guests what Italian dining is all about – an innovative menu worth crossing London for. 

2nd August, 7pm: Alyn Williams

Alyn Williams: Alyn Williams will bring his Michelin star and progressive, sophisticated cooking style to Harvey Nichols serving a brilliantly accomplished, playful menu.

Outside of these times, the S. Pellegrino ‘Live in Italian’ Terrace on the Harvey Nichols Fifth Floor will be open for lunch every day from the 10th July to the 7th August 2016, the menu will be curated by the Italian Supper Club.

For more information and to purchase tickets visit - https://billetto.co.uk/en/events/spellegrino-presents-live-in-italian

Thali - an Indian Neighbourhood Restaurant to Cross London for!

Name: Thali 

Where: 166 Old Brompton Road, London, SW5 0BA, http://www.thali.uk.com/html/home.html

Cost: Thali's a la carte menu offers small plates priced at £3.50 to £11.95 and main courses ranging from £10.95 to £14.95. The eponymous thalis are steel food plates with various small bowls containing a variety of different hot and cold dishes costing from £12 to £19. There is also a seasonal tasting menu priced at £45 per person.

The wine list is extensive including some greats like the Beaucastel Chateauneuf du Pape 2009 (£109), and Penfold Grange Hermitage 1999 (£385) perhaps reflecting the restaurant’s Brompton Road location. Entry level wines include a Chilean Chardonnay from Concha y Toro and a Cuvee du Roy Merlot 2014 from France at £18 each. 

About: Opened in 2008, Thali is a charming neighbourhood restaurant in Earls Court serving North Indian cooking created by Head Chef Dila Ram, formerly of Bombay Brasserie.

We were surprised to find it heaving on a rainy Tuesday evening when we visited with a seemingly local crowd. With white plaster and bare brick walls decorated with vintage Bollywood movie posters, and a bicycle rickshaw hanging on the wall, Thali has an elegantly casual but inviting feel.

What We Ate: We opted for the tasting menu. This featured 8 different options starting with a delicious dish called palak chaat made of marinated baby spinach, shallow fried in chickpea flower. The spinach was served very crispy topped with lightly sweetened yoghurt, coriander and tamarind sauce, onions and tomatoes. Sweet and crunchy, with refreshing tartness from the tamarind and yoghurt, this was a really lovely start to our meal.

The Archari chicken tikka followed. Marinated for 10 hours with some delicately aromatic spices, these chunky, succulent pieces of chicken breast were then grilled and served with a tangy mustard sauce.

The next dish was another highlight of our meal, not only for the delicious combination of flavours, but also for its presentation - grilled, lightly spiced scallops and cherry tomato halves were served in a creamy, delicate sun-dried tomato and basil sauce. I loved this dish – delicate yet packed with flavour.

We also had lamb chops braised in yoghurt laced with garam masala spices (green cardamom, cloves, black peppercorns, mace, cinnamon and nutmeg). Accompanied by a mint and coriander sauce, the lamb was super tender, served still slightly pink, and with a delicious savour from the tandoor oven.

And then onto the mains, there were three. One of these was Thali’s venison Bhuna, spiced with garam masala, okra, onion, cumin and tomatoes cooked in a tandoor oven. Bhuna is a traditional Indian style of cooking in which spices are fried in oil to extract their flavours, meat is then added and left to marinate for 24 hours before being cooked in its own juices. This process made for a intensely flavourful dish, rich in aromatic cardamom and other spices and with tender and succulent venison (a meat that can sometimes be rather dry if not properly cooked).

The prawn paithya featured Bengal king prawns in a tomato and onion sauce. Paithya (or pathia) dishes are cooked in a hot, sweet and sour sauce, based on tamarind pulp with garam masala spices, garlic, onion, jaggery sugar and tomato. I loved this but felt that the accompanying sauce tasted similar to the earlier scallop and tomato dish.

The final main was a well made chicken biryani, served with a refreshing  cucumber raita.

To accompany, there was an odd dish of spinach with garlic, cumin and cottage cheese, which I thought had a slightly odd, muddy texture (the spinach had been creamed with the cheese) - for me, the only weak dish on the menu.

The other accompaniments were a deliciously buttery naan, made on the premises, and a side dish of lovely okra fried with onions, tomatoes and fresh coriander.

The dessert of the day was milk dumplings – these were served hot with a warm cardamom syrup topped with chopped pistachio nuts. Though a delicately flavoured dessert, we felt it was not at par with some of the other dishes on the menu. Also a tiny dumpling per person does not quality as a proper dessert course in my opinion.

What We Drank: We shared a bottle of Duas Quintas Tinto 2012, from Ramos Pinto, Portugal (£26) - a fruit-driven, very drinkable red with soft tannins. 

Likes: We loved the crispy spinach starter, the grilled scallops and tomatoes as well as the venison main. Great service.

Dislikes: The dessert was uninspiring and a tad ungenerous, the spinach and cottage cheese accompaniment had a challenging texture though flavours were pleasant.

Verdict: There is some very good cooking at Thali. Dishes are delicately flavoured and expertly executed. I would love to return one day. Recommended.