‘Beef over coal, cooked just as it should be’

When I visited, Grassfed didn’t do puddings. If it had, I’d have been spared T’s Fried Scoop. It’s ‘the UK’S first fried ice cream company!’ screams a sign in the window. This was a novel idea to both me and my oft-dining-pal Jo, and we found it directly opposite the restaurant – so we dipped in after lunch. After dosing up on a few bites of over-processed carbs (a deep-fried sort-of doughnut encased the ice cream), my body almost shaking with the sugar and fat and the gloopy fakery that was the chocolate ice cream, sure that with any more of this heart failure would quickly follow, I fervently hoped that T’s would be both the UK’S first and last in the genre.

So let’s rewind to the good bit: lunch on this patch of gentrified Camden, in a new and compact space under the train arches where the vibe is found dining at the kitchen counter and the menu is a sweetly simple offer of mainly beef, cooked over coal, with sides.

There’s a smattering of fish, that of the day and some cured salmon to start, and a grilled cauliflower for meatdodgers. Though given the name of the restaurant and the head of a cow that adorns its sign, this is not somewhere that’s trying to attract those who fetishise vegetables.

It’s the creation of chef Paul Foster, who also has a restaurant called Salt in Stratford-upon-avon, a place he opened in 2017 having raised money through crowdfunding and where he dishes up complex fine-dining dishes inspired partly by time spent in the kinds of restaurants where tweezers and sousvide apparatus are the norm.

But now he’s cast a glance at London town and decided that he needs a place with less frippery and that the capital needs a restaurant where beef is cooked over fire. Late to the party and cornering a crowded market, perhaps, but then this never stopped anyone. Think analogous Indian restaurants, sushi bars, fish and chip shops… come to think of it, virtually every gastronomic genre becomes ludicrously multitudinous.

Speaking of which, we started with roasted bone marrow, the glorious texture of the saturated fat like a melting oyster, given crunch with a shower of breadcrumbs and then tempered by the citrussy bitterness of watercress.

And also a plate of cured salmon – any such cure providing shade to the ubiquitous smoked – which was silky smooth and perked up with beetroot and long fronds of dill. Along with some excellent toasted sourdough with garlic butter laced with beef fat, these were the perfect warm-up acts for the next bit.

Think Taylor Swift for Rascal Flatts.

We had two cuts of beef: rump and bavette. The bavette was juicy and flappy, just how it should be, but tender too. The rump was also just right and it came with great roasted potatoes, a simple green salad and some Tenderstem broccoli. The latter you could just about make out hiding under a heap of Parmesan (I’m considering inaugurating Sitwell’s Untainted Broccoli Dish of the Year Award. To win, simply serve a dish of al dente broccoli – charred if you so wish – and see if you can chain yourself to the mast and be restrained as you hear the siren call of cheese, anchovy sauce, salsa verde and nuts to drizzle all over the unsuspecting vegetable).

We were accompanied all the while by cheerful, competent service and a tidy wine list. Thus, my word to the wise: store some little pots au chocolat or lemon possets in the fridge. Keep the punters in, upsell wine. And save us from a miserable death by fried ice cream.

They’re late to the party and cornering a crowded market, perhaps, but then this never stopped anyone