John Salt with Ben Spalding, Islington
Ben Spalding, now in his mid-twenties, began his cooking career at the restaurant 28+ in Gothenburg, Sweden. He has since worked at Per Se in New York, Gordon Ramsay Royal Hospital Road, Gary Rhodes W1, L’Autre Pied, Vue de Monde in Melbourne and most recently Roganic. His departure from Simon Rogan’s Roganic in April this year was followed by Stripped Back, a weekend pop-up in London Fields playground where we first encountered his style of food.
Spalding’s latest accomplishment is a 6 month residency at the Islington pub John Salt, formerly known as Keston Lodge, owned by 580 Ltd. On the ground floor there is bar space for a chef to prepare food in front of your very eyes, cocktails to tease your palette and on the upper level is a more intimate dining area for 25-30 guests where Ben serves up his culinary creations.
Diners are treated to familiar tube map designed menus of 4, 8 or 12 courses. With two to three words listing each course, it’s really up to your imagination to figure out how the dishes will be presented, work, taste, it all adds to the anticipation. Choice is stripped from the diner, but trusting in the chefs, it doesn’t seem to matter, for nosing at other diners plates excitement is heightened. Friendly waiters although a little shaky and still finding their feet, interact with diners, explaining each composite of the meal.
A four course dinner is hardly that, more like seven as it’s piped up with amuses, bread servings, thrown in for good measure. Attention to detail from fir sunk into water bottles, to three ways of butter served on a Himalayan salt brick, appealing to be smothered on some sweet red wine bread, rosemary, chestnut and crisp bread filling a heady bread-like basket bowl. Beautiful miso soup (I’m not a fan normally) but converted by the aftermath of seaweed oil reminiscent of fresh sea water trawling for crabs in Mauritius, it took me to another place.
Clever imagination and thoughtfulness creeps into the later courses the ultimate “Chicken on a Brick”, where you are invited to lick you brick clean, coated chicken liver parfait flecked with sweetcorn kernels and crisp skin, I had some in my hair by the end of it. Not forgetting the Wild Salmon, tousled with pungent kaffir lime mayonnaise and rotten mango juice, who would of thought?
The Beef Shin served by Ben himself, explaining the importance of dousing all those gnarly beef juices over to soak up with accompanying bread, was a treat in itself, to sift through the meltingly soft layers of the beef with wild mushrooms and puree.
Momentarily confusion suppases after tasting the dessert of cucumber and peanut butter, a pool of vivid green juice, with dots of yoghurt, cucumber, Muscat grape jam and peanut butter, we hear is inspired by the chefs childhood love of peanut butter and cucumber sandwiches. Amazingly it works, never have I before experienced anything similar, yet I admire his connection with his childhood memories or experiences influencing the dishes.
131 Upper Street, N1 (020 7704 8955, reservations@john-salt.com). Open Tue–Sat for dinner, 6pm-10pm. Bar food noon-3pm and 5pm-9pm. Four/eight/12 courses for £28/£56/£85. Drinks and service extra. Bar food £6-£9 per dish.
