Every year the London restaurant week festival occurs in early October, last year I missed out and I was determined to go to as many participating restaurants as I can this year.
It happened to be my friend’s birthday during the period, being the good friend that I am I booked Gordan Ramsey on her actual birthday.
The Narrow is a bit of tricky place to look for if your coming public transport the nearest station is Limehouse DLR, I was very lucky to be escorted to the venue by local resident. The pub style restaurant overlooks the river thames, the lady at the door was very warm welcome me inside and told me to seat until the rest of my friends arrived. We was seated by the window, the view was beautiful great for candlelit intimate dinners.
The host was wonderful explained very well about Gordans other restaurants and telling us that the food at the Narrow is also Michelin star quality but more low key with the presentation of the dishes.
Well as it was London restaurant week the offer was to have either a 2 course meal for £20 or 3 courses for £24. Of course I opted for the 3 course!!!
My choice for starters was crayfish cocktail, the dish came in a half pint glasses, right at the bottom the crispy iceberg lettuce layered and smothered in cocktail sauce, the crayfish was fresh and juicy the sauce was tangy, creamy I took a good 15-20 mins to devour the dish ummm.
My friends had a potted salt beef with sourdough toast and pickles, and for starters roasted tomato soup, garlic and thyme croutons. The beef tasted very similar to corn beef, it was average nothing spectacular. The tomato soup was good, tangy, sweet bursting with flavour.
For mains 3 of us chose Braised English duck leg, wilted greens, beetroot chutney. I really enjoyed this dish, the whilted greens was boiled but still had flavours, I didn’t even realised the beetroot was chutney until now, yet it was also sweet and accompanied my vegetables nicely, the duck leg oozed tenderness and I took a good half a hour to eat my dish. The fish and chips my friend had was D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S! There was rarely a hint of beer in the batter and the chips were one of the best I’ve tried in a restaurant.
Next was desserts, I choose Banana sticky toffee pudding with clotted cream, 2 of my friends went for Apple and blackberry crumble with vanilla ice cream and last but not least Passion fruit posset with coconut and white chocolate cookie. As we waited for the desserts we were surprised by the waiter handing us a pot of mango and ice-cream. I told him “we didn’t order the dish, then the (manager came out and exclaimed that it was pre-dessert dish and we would be given it for free). What followed were us being totally blown away by the simplicity of the dessert, it was pineapple and apple sorbet with mango jelly. The mango jelly tasted exactly like mango, in the jelly form, I couldn’t work out the flavours of the sorbet so just had to ask what it was. My friend went into a food coma after the dish. All he could talk about was the mango dessert even until this day. HAHA
The desserts did not disappoint, my banana sticky pudding was the best out of the bunch, warm and not overly sweet, the clotted cream simply melted as it touched the toffee. The crumble was decent again wasn’t WOW factor. The passion fruit posset was amazing and my friend LOVED it.
Overall I really enjoyed my meal, top quality ingredients very affordable and in the docklands surrounding area, great views staff is very friendly. I shall be returning!
http://gordonramsay.com/thenarrow
