Grilled Seafood, Vegetables, and Bread at Brat // London, England

Brat is one of those places that the moment you walk in, you begin to celebrate food and chefs. The open kitchen welcomes you to watch turbots turned in cages over the flames, beef leaking fat as it sizzles on the grill, and breads being popped in and out of the pizza oven, then decorated with olive oil and anchovies. Rosemary is tossed onto the coals, then added to a row of langoustines to add aroma to a plate that delivered on every seafood fantasy one could have.

I added Brat to my must-visit list last year, when we visited in London for 3 weeks, because everyone was talking about it. The restaurant opened in March 2018 and earned its first star that following October. It also featured in the World’s 50 Best (top 100) in 2021 and 2022. With so much acclaim, it’s hard to believe we were able to walk in at 7:15pm on a Friday (without a reservation!) and get seated within 15 minutes.

The restaurant is found above the Smoking Goat in Shoreditch, and is a fusion of head chef Tomos Parry’s Welsh heritage and his admiration for the cooking styles found in the Basque country of northern Spain — this means that slow cooking over a wood fire is the focal point.

Named after the old English colloquialism for turbot, Brat’s speciality is turbot, designed for sharing: grilled whole in a handmade basket over lump wood charcoal. They work with closely with four or five different day boats and suppliers to get the best pick of turbots. When it’s not available, it’s not on the menu.

We were only 2 people, and the smallest turbot of the day was for 3-4, so we decided not to get it, but we thoroughly enjoyed our dinner nevertheless. Let’s get into it.

Ambience

While watching the chefs work in the open kitchen is cool, the restaurant itself is fairly simple. It does remind you of a Basque restaurant, with the copious amounts of wood (I mean, we were sitting around a barrel), and the large windows let in the rare British rays of sun beautifully, but it wasn’t particularly remarkable.

Drinks

Eater’s highlight of Brat featured the wine list, and they’re not wrong — the wine list here is extensive. And interesting. We had a cuvee the Brat team specially worked with a team based in Spain to create, and a Gimlet (they only had traditional cocktails). Both were very drinkable.

Food

The menu is comprised primarily of smaller dishes, with mains at the center (all meat, grilled over the fire, of course). We ordered 2 drinks, 1 appetizer, 2 sides, 2 small dishes, 2 large dishes (not mains), and a dessert, and were absolutely stuffed and had to take food to go. We could have done with one less side and one less large dish.

Spider Crab Toast (14/20)

Almost every party ordered this dish, and it was brought out with a pile of grilled greens that I think they nailed the char on — just enough to taste the smoke, but not too much to overpower the dish. under the pile of greens is crab, then a smear of hummus-like consistency, followed by the bread itself (crust off). The whole bite is quite good, but I wish it had just a punch more crab flavor.

Mackerel with Grilled Cucumbers (12/20)

This dish was fine. Chunks of mackerel and grilled cucumbers are served cold in a dashi broth and fresh greens, and while beautiful, lacked flavor.

Bread & Burnt Onion Butter (18/20)

When this came out, our eyes practically bulged out of our heads. The bread was the size of my chest, with the heft of an entire loaf, and the accompanying butter was larger than a tennis ball. The bread was warm, and soft, and so flavorful. Ironically, we had seen this one come out of the kitchen for another party, and I really wanted it but thought it was the other bread dish, and M had really not wanted it. Upon receiving it though, we were assuaged of all fears, as it was perfection in carb heaven.

We debated between this and one of the grilled breads at the top of the menu (with anchovies or wild garlic and spenwood), but once our waitress (who was very knowledgeable), heard we were ordering the velvet crab soup, she recommended we get this bread to be able to dip it into the soup. She was 150% correct.

Velvet Crab Soup (16/20)

Rich, flavorful, delicious, with huge umami and butter notes the whole way through. It was a little hard to eat the crab, as you might imagine, and we didn’t get any wet napkins to clean up after, so we just weren’t really sure what we were supposed to do. But this with the bread is a winner, and I would come back just for that combination.

Langoustines (15/20)

The first bite I took was incredible (17/20), taking me back to the shores of the Maldives where we ate the best seafood of our lives. The langoustines were just finished, still buttery soft, but as I ate more, I began to feel like it was too much raw seafood, and it lowered to a 15/20.

John Dory (13/20)

We had to look up what a John Dory was because we had never heard of it, but it’s this very spiky, boney fish. I felt obligated to try a grilled fish because we didn’t get the turbot, so this was our choice.

The bones in this fish will get you if you’re not careful, so I would only really order this if you’re experienced with eating fish. We thought it lacked any real seasoning, but the fish flavor was wonderful. We also had to take half of the fish to go and it was better when reheated the next day. Maybe because we had less butter coating our mouths when eating it again.

Smoked Potatoes (12/20)

I wanted to love these potatoes because I love potatoes, but these were very, very buttery, and some parts of the potatoes were too hard, scratching up my mouth. It also lacked the smoked flavor I expected from their name.

Burnt Cheesecake & Rhubarb (18/20)
This dessert was a winner. When we walked in and saw all of them lining the counter, we knew it was special and we had to get it, but boy were we correct. The cheesecake itself is just cooked so that it still jiggles in the pan — if you watch the IG video on slide 6 of this post, you’ll know what I mean.

The texture is soft and fluffy, consistent the whole way through, and the burnt layer on the outside adds just that little crunch of texture. The rhubarb flavor adds a bit of tartness to accentuate the creaminess of the cheesecake, and the two need each other. So yum.

Service

Waiters are very knowledgeable. Our gal was the hostess, our waitress, and also plated some food. Remarkable.

Final Thoughts

We really enjoyed watching the chefs cook, but it was hard (as a lady in a skirt) to sit side-saddled on a bar stool around a barrel. Having walked in on a Friday night at prime dinner time, this was a small price to pay, but if you’re going to go, I would recommend a reservation to get a proper seat.

This is a restaurant that focuses on high quality, fresh food, pushed into the limelight by butter, olive oil, and herbs. We paid £145 ($181.86), for 2 drinks, 1 appetizer, 2 sides, 2 small dishes, 2 large dishes (not mains), and 1 dessert, which is definitely on the expensive end, but not terrible for a 1-Michelin star. And this was so much food we had to take some to go. Unfortunately, not all the food was of the same caliber, so I do think you have to be a bit careful what you choose to order from the menu.

To conclude, we’d say food was 15/20, ambience was 14/20, service was 14/20, and value for money was 13/20. Overall, 14/20.