The Baring, London N1: 'Where the pub restaurants are heading' - restaurant review | Grace Dent on restaurants
En route to the newly refurbished Baring in Islington, I wondered if we needed a new, better word for 'gastropub', not least because no one has ever liked that word in any event. In the 2000s, it was synonymous with the disappearance of old-fashioned, often cherished things: printed menus, affordable burgers, sticky mats and packets of Big D peanuts stuck on a card behind the bar which, with each purchase, revealed more than one almost naked woman called Bev. None of them survived the great gastropub purge. That said, if you liked chick, wild arugula, chalkboards, Farrow & Ball paint, Cotes du Rhone, and eating on 50s crockery while sitting in a very stiff hard-backed chair, this was a golden age.
In the UK in 2022, however, almost all new pub businesses are "gastro" to some extent, the name and CV of the chef being announced at the same time, and with the same weighting, as those of the owner. Not all of these gastropubs are the same, however, and many are just chain pubs in disguise and with a proper microwave. The Baring, however, is an extremely good restaurant serving up the likes of quail shish, pig's cheek and smoked eel terrine, and has taken root in a once-loved old building. The chef is Rob Tecwyn, formerly of Dabbous, which was a cool Fitzrovia restaurant revered at the highest level by the food crowd. “Are we going to Dabbous on Saturday? someone would suggest a Wednesday around 2015, and I would break down in peals of joy because the place was sold out for the next 20 weeks at least. Tecwyn has also cooked at a number of brilliant and reliable restaurants where I often send people for advice: the Bull & Last in Highgate, Moro, Morito and Kerridge's Bar & Grill to name a few.
Her new home...
En route to the newly refurbished Baring in Islington, I wondered if we needed a new, better word for 'gastropub', not least because no one has ever liked that word in any event. In the 2000s, it was synonymous with the disappearance of old-fashioned, often cherished things: printed menus, affordable burgers, sticky mats and packets of Big D peanuts stuck on a card behind the bar which, with each purchase, revealed more than one almost naked woman called Bev. None of them survived the great gastropub purge. That said, if you liked chick, wild arugula, chalkboards, Farrow & Ball paint, Cotes du Rhone, and eating on 50s crockery while sitting in a very stiff hard-backed chair, this was a golden age.
In the UK in 2022, however, almost all new pub businesses are "gastro" to some extent, the name and CV of the chef being announced at the same time, and with the same weighting, as those of the owner. Not all of these gastropubs are the same, however, and many are just chain pubs in disguise and with a proper microwave. The Baring, however, is an extremely good restaurant serving up the likes of quail shish, pig's cheek and smoked eel terrine, and has taken root in a once-loved old building. The chef is Rob Tecwyn, formerly of Dabbous, which was a cool Fitzrovia restaurant revered at the highest level by the food crowd. “Are we going to Dabbous on Saturday? someone would suggest a Wednesday around 2015, and I would break down in peals of joy because the place was sold out for the next 20 weeks at least. Tecwyn has also cooked at a number of brilliant and reliable restaurants where I often send people for advice: the Bull & Last in Highgate, Moro, Morito and Kerridge's Bar & Grill to name a few.
Her new home...
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