Address: Pop Brixton

Booking via the website: https://www.onlyfoodandcourses.co.uk/

This is a brand new, top of the range, eatery in Pop Brixton that opened only weeks ago. They have all day dining -12.00 to 5.00 pm and then a supper club in the evening (8.00 pm to 10.00 pm, Thurs-Sat), when they serve a fixed six course tasting menu. They will take walk-ins during the day but not for the evening, but it is best to book any time as there is limited seating. We visited for a long Sunday lunch with friends in May.

They describe their food as ” From Caf’ clichés, to dinner party classics, and cocktails raided from your mum’s drinks cabinet, this is the best of British nostalgia”. A great description of the deconstructed classics from the 70s and 80s.

We made it simple and ordered one of everything on the lunchtime menu – four starters, four mains and two desserts. The titles of the dishes give nothing away – Bloody Mary’, ‘Ham, Egg & Chips’, Prawn Cocktail and ……..a surprise for you, as we can’t remember. From the pictures you can see that they are splendid renditions, with just enough to interest everyone and it was just too hard to decide a favourite. The Bloody Mary consists of a granita which comes with roast tomatoes and chickpea chips. Ham, egg and chips is a terrine with more chickpea chips and egg yolks. But we don’t want to spoil the fun which is wrapped up in the surprise, so here the detail stops. Even on the first two photos you will see there are “extras” – ask them to describe them in detail. You may need to take notes as we forgot as soon as they moved away from the table.

For the main course we got Smoked Short Rib Hash, Crab Scotch Egg, Lobster Doughnuts and we think it was a duck eclairs, but it was really “pretty as a picture” even on a rainy Sunday. The beef had a rich sauce, the scotch egg was runny and had crab instead of meat and the others…. well my mouth is watering just looking at them.

We were pretty full at this stage and the small plates do ramp up the charges, but we decided to complete the whole menu with the two remaining items – Lemon Meringue and Beetroot Bakewell. Again pretty as all desserts should be. The bakewell was a bit dry, but the lemon tart a sensation.

We washed it all down with several Brixton brews.

This is not a cheap meal, but it is an excellent one. We ate far too much and each plate was between £10 and £14 – so you can see that splashing out on every part of the menu increased costs considerably. These were quirky plates, pretty but also good to eat – next time we visit we will try not to be too hungry and just look at them for a bit longer before pulling them all apart. Their six course tasting menu (which we will have to try, but maybe for a special occasion) is £65.00.