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London Stock review interior

London Stock Review

London Stock Review

Ram Quarter’s fine dining restaurant 

Follow the very tall chimney towering above Wandsworth Town and you’ll find yourself at Ram Quarter – this historic spot has been the home of brewing for centuries and has recently been redeveloped into atmospheric squares featuring apartments, cafes, bars and some cool new restaurants.

London Stock is the fine-dining offering, featuring an eight-course tasting menu highlighting the talents of new head chef Sebastian Rast, who previously worked at Above at HIDE in Piccadilly and trained with Le Cordon Bleu.

On a rainy December evening, we dashed from our Uber to Schooner, a lovely bar that does a mean Negroni, then raced through the drizzle across the square to London Stock. I’d seen the space before when touring the Ram Quarter site and the neighbouring Sambrook’s Brewery. It’s a small intimate restaurant yet with high ceilings and a balcony floor above. It could be a difficult room to make work and I was interested to see what the atmosphere would be like in the evening.

We loved the exposed bricks and nods to art deco in the decor with a green tiled bar and touches of brass. There is something quite wharf-side Boston or New York about the place, and it has a good vibe to it. We weren’t so keen on being sat next to an empty wine fridge, complete with its jarring back lighting, and felt that some candles could have created more of a pleasant glow on our table.

Nevertheless, we were warmly welcomed and there was an extremely knowledgable sommelier on hand to guide our selection for the eight-course tasting menu.

The menu is ambitious. We started with some excellent croissanty bread and amuse bouches before embarking on the first of the dishes – Jerusalem artichoke with girolles, black garlic and thyme. It had the deep earthy flavour I like in artichokes and while it was clever – the inside is carpaccio of the artichoke, the outside is the crisped up skin and the whole thing reshaped to look like the original vegetable – I wasn’t so keen on the contrast of temperatures and textures.

That, however, was the only one that didn’t work for me – the succession of dishes that came afterwards were sublime – stand-outs included mackerel served with golden beetroot and buttermilk – beautifully torched skin, moist and with a great foil of the creamy buttermilk. Duck breast – delicious. A ravioli of pumpkin served with a mushroom broth was so simple, clever and wonderful.

And then on to a perfectly-cooked scallop (served prettily in its shell on a bed of teeny tiny decorative shells). And venison saddle – they all worked so well. We were really full by the time desserts arrived… but a classy twist on the chestnut Mont Blanc finished off the meal well.

The menu changes seasonally and we look forward to returning. There is some seriously excellent cooking on offer here. Love the look of the place, too, and in better weather, you can sit outside on the expansive terrace. A great addition to the south west London dining scene.

The eight-course tasting menu is priced at £70. There is also a vegetarian tasting menu.  A lighter lunch option offers three dishes for £35.

londonstockrestaurant.co.uk

 

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The history of Ram Quarter