Bistrotheque, Wadeson Street, www.bistrotheque.com

 

Last Saturday morning, having squeezed through the hordes of Broadway market goers basking in this new concept called sun, we walked around the corner to embrace the calmness of Bistrotheque. It is amusing coming off Cambridge Heath Road into loads of warehouses and the only indication of a restaurant being the other people walking around lost and stumbling in mechanics and sketchy art galleries. Situated upstairs in an unmarked building, the Bistrotheque room sits below a very light and airy white vaulted warehouse ceiling with frosted windows. Assumedly the windows in place so the riff-raff still walking round these parts (everyone knows the crazy guy with a high-vis jacket who stalks people by Frockney Rebel) don’t start to lob empty cans of Skol at the candle lit windows.

The atmosphere is relaxed in a smart way – you don’t find many places with white table cloths round these parts but the brunch menu was very fairly priced, probably similar to most bigger dishes you will find on the Broadway market stalls.  I started with a Bloody Mary – and Bistro managed to break a cardinal BM rule of doing a tiny bit too much by adding chipotle spices – a BM should not taste like an Old El Passo fajita, however different or unique that might make it. They also served a home made lemonade that was so sharp it could have been used to sear off ulcers, in a good way. However the duck hash with poached egg more than made up for the smokey mary. The hash was crisp with a decent helping of large chunks of duck, it came topped with a poached egg and was finished with a mustard sauce, the only tiny let down of the dish being this slightly favourless, tepid sauce. It should have also come with mushrooms, but given that I deplore fungus I opted to forgo it. Even without this the dish was a very tasty breakfast, not dissimilar to the Duck and Waffle, except a billion times cheaper. My girlfriend opted for a blueberry pancakes with mascarpone. These were huge, frisbee sized pancakes which upgraded the richness of cream with the richness of a creamy cheese, well played.

The restaurant service is smart, all ipads and table cloth scraping but it is a pleasant place and definitely worth a visit with the evening menu looking pretty special. It isn’t cheap, but this is definitely somewhere to go when you have won some money or the parents are paying or you are planning on proposing to your mistress or something.

Bouchon Fourchette, Mare Street, http://www.bouchonfourchette.co.uk

 

Situating a French Bistro next to the Dolphin on Mare Street is a bit like putting the Eiffel Tower in Grimsby. This was confirmed when we arrived at Bouchon Fourchette and the warm blue lighting which lit the room emanated from two police cars and a police van outside arresting someone. You don’t get atmosphere like this in Le Gavroche, but if I didn’t love this type of atmosphere I would be crying whilst looking on Zoopla for a flat in Highgate.

 

The converted shop feels like a proper restaurant, in terms of there being no east London benches, all the chair matched, there wasn’t a ‘small plate’ in sight, and meals came out at the fashion of - starter – main – desert. Hurrah! There was even a family in there. There was obviously exposed brick, but I am now sure this is part of an obscure Hackney licensing law.

 

The menu is traditional French fare at incredibly good prices. We started with a camembert which came spiked with garlic and a side salad with a French dressing. It had the classic feety twang everyone now loves and stayed impressively runny throughout the dining time. Nothing angers one more than jabbing your bread at solidified cheese before resorting to peeling it off with your nails. However, it was runny boxed cheese and salad. I am not sure how French people eat camembert but if isn’t with bread then it is confusing.  However an order of bread quickly provided an appropriate vessel to funnel the molten cheese into face. For the main I went with the fish of the day – which was Lemon Sole – on the menu for £11. This was confusing given that in normal establishments the bones of the Lemon Sole normally clock in at £11. The fish came and was pleasingly cooked, charred but still moist and a surprisingly good portion for just over a tenner.

 

Pleasingly BF didn’t opt for the annoying tact of a providing cheap protein only to discover it comes with a single (or no) leaf to leave you wantonly wondering if you should order chips. The side was a generous double portion of green beans wrapped in bacon. My girlfriend got a French take on the aubergine parmigana of courgette gratin which actually works much better: the courgettes don’t turn to mush and held the tomato sauce, which could of held its own as a soup or amouse bouche. It only cost £8! Anyone taking out a vegetarian go here and confound their fear of French food (and hopefully trick them into going into a Parisian restaurant to find out the only veggy thing they can eat is Onion Soup laced with beef stock).

 

Desert was an deep tasting concoction of home-made chocolate sauce, brownie and cream and more sauce with ice cream (chocolate obvs) in a sundae glass for two people which was a reasonable £7. The bottled house wine (they have house barrel as well) was notably tasty and they had a really nice desert wine – I think, it was like drinking thin alchoholic syrup - at fair prices. Just in case you didn’t feel like you were robbing the place they even have an offer for a free glass of house wine with any main course in April.

 

The only criticism I can think of was that it was a tiny bit cold in the restaurant but everywhere which isn’t a new build is cold in hackney at the moment. Bouchon Fourchette is the 'dream' neighbourhood restaurant – everything is good value, the food is interesting, comforting and tasty and service is relaxed and friendly. Also after getting nicely drunk on French wine and you can go do 9 Sambucas in the Dolphin afterwards. Win, win.