Review at a glance: ★★★☆☆
Not to review one place by talking about another, but in the Amex desert of suburban Islington is a restaurant so improbable it might have opened by mistake. Homeowners in these parts subscribe to the Mindful Chef and understand hot Pilates; the announcement of Goodbye Horses came with a picture of the chefs on horseback, pulling poses better suited to postcard smut or an indie album cover. Did they lose their way trying to make it to Clapton?
The cellar is full of natural wine; shelves groan with vintage records; art is Cocteau-meets-Miro. They do things like kohlrabi oysters, goat’s curd and marjoram — you know the type. It’s four-shining-stars brilliant, but in acute need of cushions. Those seats. God. I imagine there are prison showers that are less painful.
The team should canter Ladbroke Grove way, to south London chef Dom Taylor’s new Caribbean restaurant, Marvee’s Food Shop. We slumped into chrome-tubed, black leather lobby chairs and sighed into sleepy, seraphic smiles. Surely somewhere in this room there’s a seat with an inbuilt recliner? Some restaurants lay rigid slabs as seats in the hope uncomfortable customers will pay up quickly and make way for others.
Marvee’s — named for Taylor’s mother Marveline — might be inviting diners to stay the weekend. It is as far from the Instagram-face, flat-pack restaurant as one can go. About half is covered in floral, orange-and-brown wallpaper, the kind that wouldn’t look out of place on a set for Abigail’s Party. The other end is a soupy black but bright thanks to the huge windows of the UNDR building, in which it sits, and reminiscent, in some way, of a youth centre.
The bar at the back helps; so does the floor, which looks beaten from a thousand dances. The effect is not unpleasant: instead it feels familiar, perhaps homemade. Without affectation. The best seats in the house are, in fact, out of it: there is a terrace gazing across Portobello Green, with its tall palms and banana trees with leaves like feather flags. Once a private chef, Taylor made his name winning telly show Five Star Kitchen, and with his prize — a pop-up in the Langham called The Good Front Room.
Good? It was great. Maniacally eyed service, but that’s five-star hotels for you. This is not that; they stir different feelings. But those who fondly recall the food will find much to like here, though less choice. There are, for instance, no starters. The menu is built around “main characters” — courses — things like jerk chicken with jerk sauce and plantain jam, or escovitch fish in a vague “sweet sauce”.
With them, if wanted and at no extra cost, come “highlights” — Belgian-style waffles. There are smarts behind the idea of these: one is billed as bammy, the flatbread made from cassava; the other is festival, the deep-fried sweet dough. Clever, though the difference between them is negligible and their presence baffling. Does curry need a waffle? Why?
Dark rum and raisin coated pork belly is presented as two rectangular prisms; behind us, two friends vividly debate the validity of raisins in Caribbean food. They cannot agree.
The pork is compelling, sweet, sticky stuff. It arrives with a chock of cabbage that’s barely flirted with the grill.
The pork is compelling, sweet, sticky stuff. It arrives with a chock of cabbage that’s barely flirted with the grill. The pork is good but perhaps no more than that, but the curry goat is a soother, a softener, a dish that settles the wrongs. The meat — shoulder at a guess — has been cooked into helplessness: it offers no resistance. Ginger, garlic and cinnamon crackle through it. We shared reluctantly.
Sides at £7 and sauces at £3.50 hauled the bill up. Spicy pumpkin rice was devoured; hot pepper sauce flared the nostrils; oxtail gravy was from the curry goat school and just as pacifying. We ate greedily, happily, only a little put out that none of it was hot. Warm would be a compliment. This is easy to fix.
Before opening, Taylor billed the place as a tribute to the traditional Caribbean takeaway. Perhaps; I have not been in enough to know. It explains the understated “food shop” billing. And the lack of starters. But Taylor’s really opened somewhere to stay, to sit with a few drinks. They must want you to settle in. Otherwise why go to all that trouble with the chairs?
Marvee’s Food Shop. Meal for two about £90. 3 Thorpe Close, W10 5TZ, marveesfoodshop.com
