Tatale, London SE1: 'Elegant, but decidedly homemade' - restaurant review | Grace Dent on restaurants
Tatale, a new pan-African restaurant, is hitting the London food scene at a time when it can't help but make competitors look slightly dull. Recent blitzes in the capital have taken on a familiar shape: revamped swanky pubs serving salt marsh lamb at almost £35 a meal, expensive pastries by famous international chefs and over 100 covers, open brasseries all day who look attractive in public relations. photos, but offer a menu so dull that you'll snore in your chicken paillard like the dormouse at the Mad Hatter's tea party.
Waiting, on the sidelines and making plans , was Akwasi Brenya-Mensa and his vision for Tatale, an upgrade from his popular supper club to a permanent home at the brand new Africa Center in Southwark. Its menus are largely West African, but each dish strongly evokes a childhood in South London, trips to Israel and South Africa and family trips to Ghana. So expect crispy, warm, panko-wrapped ackee croquettes, zesty with citrus and a Scotch bonnet kick, plus the silkiest black-eyed bean hummus with tangy red palm oil and a base note of dukkah influenced by time spent in Tel Aviv, and served with crispy plantain chips. This is a very good hummus that is life changing. Brenya-Mensa also celebrates the laid-back joys of the Ghanaian roadside “chop bar” with a simple bowl of her mother’s “red red” black-eyed bean stew served with a whole baked plantain and sprinkled with edible flowers. perched in the center of the bowl. It's a West African recipe with a modern twist, and delivered with unwavering sentimental accuracy.
Brenya-Mensa, who was trained by James Cochran at 12:51, is clearly not the first or only chef from South East England to offer chicken plantain, ackee or chichinga.However, the large and expensive new Pan-African openings with gorgeous art installations, bespoke furniture and a separate cocktail bar are certainly thin on the ground.The walls are in deep indigo, and the vividly patterned chairs and sofas in traditional Ghanaian styles by
Tatale, a new pan-African restaurant, is hitting the London food scene at a time when it can't help but make competitors look slightly dull. Recent blitzes in the capital have taken on a familiar shape: revamped swanky pubs serving salt marsh lamb at almost £35 a meal, expensive pastries by famous international chefs and over 100 covers, open brasseries all day who look attractive in public relations. photos, but offer a menu so dull that you'll snore in your chicken paillard like the dormouse at the Mad Hatter's tea party.
Waiting, on the sidelines and making plans , was Akwasi Brenya-Mensa and his vision for Tatale, an upgrade from his popular supper club to a permanent home at the brand new Africa Center in Southwark. Its menus are largely West African, but each dish strongly evokes a childhood in South London, trips to Israel and South Africa and family trips to Ghana. So expect crispy, warm, panko-wrapped ackee croquettes, zesty with citrus and a Scotch bonnet kick, plus the silkiest black-eyed bean hummus with tangy red palm oil and a base note of dukkah influenced by time spent in Tel Aviv, and served with crispy plantain chips. This is a very good hummus that is life changing. Brenya-Mensa also celebrates the laid-back joys of the Ghanaian roadside “chop bar” with a simple bowl of her mother’s “red red” black-eyed bean stew served with a whole baked plantain and sprinkled with edible flowers. perched in the center of the bowl. It's a West African recipe with a modern twist, and delivered with unwavering sentimental accuracy.
Brenya-Mensa, who was trained by James Cochran at 12:51, is clearly not the first or only chef from South East England to offer chicken plantain, ackee or chichinga.However, the large and expensive new Pan-African openings with gorgeous art installations, bespoke furniture and a separate cocktail bar are certainly thin on the ground.The walls are in deep indigo, and the vividly patterned chairs and sofas in traditional Ghanaian styles by
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