Peckish Perfect Pub : Morgan Arms

You can't beat a really good boozer in my opinion but in London they're not so easy to come across. On the rare occasion you do hit the pub jackpot, hang on for dear life to the knowledge and be strictly strategic about who you tell, or you run the risk of it becoming the hot spot for every Tom, Dick & Harry! Seeing as you're part of my extended Mouse family, I'm going to share my latest pub love with you all...

Step forward, The Morgan Arms … tucked back from Bow station, nestled besides a gorgeous little square surrounded by row upon row of charming townhouses. It really is quite the picturesque spot which was a pleasant surprise as let's be honest, Bow isn't famous for it's beauty now is it? 

 

So a few Sundays ago I had arranged a girly catch-up with my very good and utterly gorgeous university pal, Lauren. I should probably draw your attention to the fact that I was appallingly hungover (Champagne brunch escapades the previous day to blame for that!). As a result, I was feeling incredibly sorry for myself - cue the ever so quiet violins, remember I have a Champagne head! I had given Lauren the heads up on the 'situation' so when I arrived I was greeted with an almighty bear hug! I immediately perked up - the prospect of a lazy afternoon of chatter and yummy food with one of my favourite people was just too good to waste by wallowing in hungover self-pity!

So first impressions - 10 out of 10. Pretty duck egg blue painted exterior, cute hanging baskets housing colourful happy petals and brass arched lights illuminated the drinking house. It helped that it was a miserable drizzly day outside, so as soon as I stepped through the doors I felt a rush of toasty warmth and was met with smiles all round! 

 

We headed straight to our table, nestled slap bang in the middle of the action offering up the perfect view of the glorious kitchen and head chef hard at work. We were immediately asked what we would like to drink. My answer, very quickly, was 'are you frickin' kidding me? Does this grey face look like it could handle any form of booze right now…??? I'll stick to cucumber infused water please' … our waiter nodded knowingly and scurried off, only to return 5 minutes later offering up Berroca - now if this doesn't award one brownie points, I don't know what will! Our food order was taken super quickly by our uber attentive waiter, there's no faffing around in this stellar establishment. Everything sounded uber-tasty but we generically went for the Sunday roast beef. I had heard huge hype about the tasty gravy and melt in your mouth fluffy yorkshire puds so I was pretty excited to taste-test these bad boys for myself… 

 

And....I'm happy to report that the roast was rip-roaringly superb! Beasting portions, vegetables cooked to perfection with that all important crunch, moreishly divine roasty potatoes, rare beef packed full of flavour and the gravy and yorkshires lived up to our sky high expectations. I was practically bursting at the seams when I took my last mouthful and whimped out of ordering dessert. Big mistake, HUGE! Lauren put her food sweats to one side and indulged in the passionfruit panna cotta. I had a cheeky mouthful when it arrived and regretted my rash decision immediately - light, creamy and stunningly sweet.

 

Will I be making a return visit? Damn straight I will! A weekly occurrence is most certainly on the cards in fact. Thumbs up, claps all round, gold star-worthy - Morgan Arms, two words … YOU. ROCK. 

The Morgan Arms

43 Morgan St 

Bow

London 

E3 5AAT

0208 980 6389

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

Heavenly Heddon Street...

With so many swoon-worthy new restaurants and bars opening up in London every week, it's hard to keep track of the must versus the dust. So in true 3BM style we've been out and about taste-testing for you - major hardship!!! Today we present Heddon Street Kitchen...

Gordon Ramsay's latest addition to his ever expanding empire - soon he'll be ruling the restaurant kingdom single-handedly and if his Mac n Cheese side is anything to go by we'll be all the more merrier and happier for it! Brand spanking new, this little hot spot only opened last weekend, so I decided to get ahead of the crowds and check it out early doors. 

First impressions were glowing as Gordon R himself graced us with his presence, (for a mere five minutes, but still...) - gold star service or what! The all-day brasserie is set just off Regent Street, and takes the place of The Living Room, right next to Strawberry Moons but we won't dwell on that fact!!! Spanning two floors, boasting an impressive wine tasting and pairing counting, a raw bar, a terrace out front and an open kitchen so you can watch the masterchefs at work, always a nice touch! 

Moving onto the grub ... my pal and I opted for the warm Bang Bang chicken salad with bags of flavour and the California maki rolls with snow crab, avocado and tobiko to start. 

Swiftly followed by the HSK short rib beef burger with marrowbone, hickory smoked bacon ketchup and Monterey Jack and the slow-roasted Dingley Dell pork belly with spiced apple sauce. 

If that wasn't enough we also ordered up the the to-die-for macaroni cheese with garlic roasted crumbs - yum! But the pièce de résistance is the dedicated ice cream bar upstairs where you can create your own retro desserts and boozy cocktails!

#winning

Heddon Street Kitchen

3 - 9 Heddon Street 

London 

W1B 4BE

3BM Review: Aolha to Pond...

Us Mice are always on the look out for new restaurants that come with a healthy portion of rave reviews! Grace Dent (ES Mag food critic) is pretty much our go-to-gal when it comes to hot openings in town - she's firm yet fair and says it pretty much how it is which means you trust her with your taste buds when it comes to good food. She's also hilariously funny with it, quite often taking the piss out of herself ... a snippet from a previous article ... "another curious pleasure of my job is being re-reminded what an absolute tit I am on a regular basis" ... love her! Anyway only the other week I was reading one of her gorgeously descriptive Friday write ups on new Hawaiian themed cuisine restaurant, Pond. See her review here. Just up the road from the London Mousehold in Dalston, I had to check it out. The following Saturday night ... it ... was ... on! 

All of the week before, I had been counting down the days, hours and minutes to my reservation. The anticipation was sky high! I had arranged to go with my J-Lo-double-bootilicious uni pal, Anna and I couldn't wait to catch up and fill up on delicious food all fuelled with a couple of bottles of decent wine. Saturday arrived and so did Anna. After a swift glass of bubbles and excitable speed-light chatter, we put our stilettos on and fled my flat in search of Pond life!

My first impressions of the area surrounding Pond was a mixture of confusion and disorientation! You turn off Kingsland Road and find yourself in the middle of a grubby random square, featuring a tired looking jazz club and a number of food stalls that you frankly wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole. I turned to Anna with a look of disgust, thinking we had come to the wrong end of town! Turns out we hadn't and Pond was just across the square down a beaten track lined with wheelie bins ... not quite what I had envisaged! Putting that to one side we pushed open the entrance door to uncover a Victorian warehouse dressed up to the industrial-chic nines - exposed bricks, pipe-laced ceilings, bronzed metal details and concrete everywhere. 

We decided to skip drinks and head straight to our table to order up. The dining space is kept separate from the main bar area and is surprisingly small. Peppered with several striking scalloped edged red booths, which sadly we didn't get allocated - boo hoo. Here's what we missed out on...

After settling down and selecting a bottle of Pinot Noir, we turned to the perfectly formed menu to cherry pick our dishes of choice. I had read and heard great things about the spam chips. Definitely not something I would ever choose myself but I felt it would be rude to ignore all of the hyped word of mouth plus apparently Hawaiians class spam chips as a delicacy and as such are considered some of the world's most devoted fans of Spam! So we caved and ordered a portion to pick on before diving into our main options. They arrived and were jaw-droppingly moreish - fried in shrimp and served up with yuzu mayo - seriously delish! 

For main I went with the Sambal Black Cod - shrimp-coated black cod fillet with kailan, glutinouse shiitake mushroom rice, sambal sauce and miso-poached egg and Anna opted for the Maui Charcoal Avocado - salmon poke in charred avo with scallop, king prawn, marinated wakame seaweed, glass noodles and salted coconute and macademia creme. Both heavenly, but Anna's did have the edge and I have to admit the dreaded food envy feeling did creep in and sit with me for the duration of her food appreciation squeals of delight - damn that girl!

For puds we went halves on the baked cheesecake of dreams! To die for...

Food finished, there was nothing else for it but to order up another bottle of the good stuff and retire to the bar area for more girly chatter and drunken antics... 

The perfect Saturday night...

Pond Dalston

Stamford Works

3 Gillett Street

London 

N16 

020 3772 6727

Sipping at 5CC...

Last week we brought you a London Cocktail Week post pin-pointing all the freakin' fabulous bars scattered across London that were offering up a one-off week-long delectable cocktail for just £4 a pop. The London mice didn't actually take advantage of this offer (I think we momentarily lost our minds for the week) but we did check out one of the participating bars ... 5CC after their kind PR agency invited us down for an evening of scrumptious finger food and mind-blowingly moreish cocktails....

5CC has actually been on my radar and hit list for some time now. This cocktail den is so well nestled below the Well & Bucket (a favourite haunt of mine on Bethnal Green Road) that one could be forgiven for it slipping through the net but once found, it's a keeper.

Neon-rays light the stairs to the basement hideaway, guiding you in off the street and down to the pièce de résistance. Candlelit and effortlessly cool with a grungy east london vibe - I knew instantly we were going to be very happy here!

Even the bar menu cries out cool and kooky - hand drawn illustrations pepper the pages transforming a plain menu into a mini storybook of cocktails so enticing we wanted to stay up well past our bedtime and taste-test everything...

Myslef, Mini and honorary London mouse V, ordered up a round of Rhubarb Daiquiri cocktails to get us started.

First thing to note is the mixologist knows his stuff. He personally delivered us the lovingly crafted concoctions explaining their ingredients and make up in wonderfully descriptive detail - it was clear he loved what he does through and through, or he might have just sampled one too many of his own creations - who knows, who cares - he was awesome! Our waitress, Nadia, also deserves a special mention. She went out of her way to make sure we had a blast and couldn't have been more attentive from start to finish. Together they ran the floor like a well-oiled machine. Check out our snap with Nadia...

We also trialled the 'Spector' - white rum, elderflower cordial, lemon juice, lychee juice and egg white, the 'Spiced Pear Martini' - vodka, pear, apple, spiced syrup and lime juice and a round of 'Porn Star Martinis' - delish, divine, devilishly deadly! 

Next up ... the grub! If the cocktails were anything to go by, we were in for a treat. With the help and guidance of waitress-extrondaire Nadia, we ordered up a couple of lobster rolls, crab and cheese fries, pulled pork sliders, peri peri chicken sliders, a crab, avocado and king prawn salad and a pint of prawns with aioli amazingness. Word of warning, we expected the portions to be on the small side like most London-based bars serve up ... not this one ... the portions are punchy - just how we like them! The food arrived and the chatter dried up in an instant while we devoured the spread laid before our eyes ... Verdict? Delectable down to the very last crumb!

We'll be back. Fact.

Well and Bucket - 5CC

143 Bethnal Green Rd 

London

E2 7DG

020 3664 6454

Bee's Knees Barnyard...

Barnyard in a nutshell is small but perfectly formed, when I come to think of it a lot like Mini Mouse! Serving up oh-so-delicious grub with a first come, first serve policy so no ridonkulous two-month waiting lists to sit out.

Chef, Ollie Dabbous’ second venture, his first being the notoriously hard to get into but utterly impressive, Dabbous. Myself, Mini Mouse and two fabulous friends, were lucky enough to bag ourselves a table at Dabbous when it first opened and were blown away by the tasting menu – I knew I was in for something a little more low-key with Barnyard but none the less I was pretty excited to taste-test Dabbous’ latest foodie creation!

Located on bustling Charlotte Street, I headed there on a Thursday night with a few work pals for a much needed team night out! Apparently the queues have been pretty out of control but we were lucky enough to be seated immediately on the upper mezzanine level, ideal spot for people watching!

So décor - we’re talking industrial chic meets rustic barn vibes – peeling wallpaper, bricks, corrugated iron walls, low hanging metal lights and chunky distressed wooden worktops. Basically my dream kind of interior. 

The restaurant does show its softer side too with jugs of beautiful flowers scattered around the barn... 

First up and most importantly … a strong drink! We were instantly drawn to the fun sounding shandies, from the ‘Barnyard’ made up of homemade lemonade, gin and abro larger to ‘Hedgerow shandy’ which was a pink grapefruit, tonic, sloe gin and wyld wood cider concoction! We all opted for the shandy of our dreams and merrily kept them coming! 

Their also offering a seriously impressive array of boozy milkshakes - strawberry and elderflower, popcorn, malt and blueberry pancake to name a few, all of which come spiked with a good dose of alcohol from bourbon to tequila – my kinda shake!

The menu is made up of lots of small plates to share, all grouped under food type e.g. cow, beef, eggs etc. – always a winner if the portions are big enough as it means that you get to taste a little bit of everything, escaping the dreaded food envy feeling! Thankfully the portions were on the manly scale so no rationing necessary! Our dishes all pretty much arrived at the same time – a big fan of that – and were beautifully presented in blue and white enamel dishes adding to the casual dining experience Dabbous is shooting for.

We ordered up just about everything on the menu. Starting with warm cornbread that came presented in a brown paper bag stamped with the date – heavenly buttery bread that had us all oohing and ahhing. A good sign of what lay ahead…

Then the food just kept on coming and coming from seriously moreish homemade sausage rolls with piccalilli…

…to grilled spring lamb with mint sauce, peas and radishes… 

Green asparagus with soft boiled egg, chervil & sunflower seeds… 

We also devoured crispy chicken wings with smoked paprika, garlic & lemon which were, in true KFC-style, finger lickin’ good, corn on the cob with gorgeously salty butter and of course good old fashioned French fries!

After all of that we were about ready to pop but we couldn’t leave without trying some of the puds on offer so we waved our waiter over and ordered up a few potions of the naughty but nice popcorn ice cream with smoked fudge sauce and then Eton Mess which is always delish! 

One word – epic. Add this gem to the little black book pronto – go, immediately!

Barnyard 

18 Charlotte Street

Fitzrovia

London 

W1T 2LY

020 7580 3842