Bacchus review by Edward
I was taken here as a birthday treat, so I should probably be careful what I say. That notwithstanding, however, I can still hopefully give a balanced review.
First the environs. Given it's about 3 minutes from Hoxton square, I think anyone who finds themselves nervous in this part of town needs to get out more. Having said that, if your idea of an edgy area is Fulham Broadway, you'd probably be better to get a taxi to and from the restaurant.
The restaurant itself looks like a pub that's been gutted and replaced with tables. Unfortunately, being a Tuesday night there were few other covers, and therefore I would think the atmosphere was not at its best. Nevertheless, it was pleasant, if not slightly too open for my liking.
As for the food, this is the first time I’ve ever had a 'tasting menu', and while I believe other restaurants offer such menus as a way of sampling the best of their kitchen, restaurants such as Bacchus specialise in offering only the tasting menus, without being able to order individual dishes as mains. To this end, I think Bacchus serves very well as a laboratory. Not only did we have the 7 course + wines, we were also treated to 2 additional starters, and an additional main; clearly destined to be future menu items, given the feedback requested by our waitress. The dishes themselves were of a very high quality, however, as the menu changes once per month, I think it's probably pot luck as to whether there'll be enough on the menu for you to enjoy. Personally I hate oysters, and found myself presented with 2 courses of oyster, served in different ways. As it turned out, the first (the additional main mentioned above) was not that nice, but the 2nd, with a delicate bread, and onion soup was delicious.
The wines also were good. Frankly we were staggering out by the end, and that was without consuming anything but the accompanying wines (bonus point - they served tap water without asking). There was only one wine pairing that didn't work for me, which was a powerful aussie shiraz with the slow cooked ox cheeks, but otherwise it's worthwhile to go with the matching wines.
The service was also exceptional, and we had a very knowledgeable waitress, even going so far as to put a birthday candle on my dessert. Having said that, however good your knowledge of food, I can guarantee there will be plenty of ingredients you've never heard of. To that end, they could have been serving pretty much anything, and we would have nodded and smiled. Some might call that pretentious, but I’d prefer to think of it as a learning experience (not least as I’ve kept the menu and can now go away and work out what exactly it was we were eating).
Overall, I think this is an experience best viewed in retrospect. Looking at the menu and talking with friends, I realised that almost all of the dishes were in fact superb, and I would gladly have ordered any of them on their own as mains; however, the sensory overload of the entire menu is just too much. This for me is where the Bacchus experience falls down. I'd quite like to go back there and select the Red mullet and liquorice, or the succulent Ox cheeks, but I know I’d have to fork out a small fortune (over £100 a head) and have the entire menu instead. As a result, I’m very glad for the 'tick in the box', but I’m not sure I can justify a return visit.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Overall rating 
Food 8 | Service 9 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 6
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