Doing the birthday honours at Ducksoup

So, I had a big number birthday recently. Funny thing is that I’ve noticed the bigger the number of the birthday the less enthusiastic I feel about it. It was great then when the Delightful Dining Companion (DDC) & Queen of the Wharf (QOW) got together to take me out for a birthday surprise and we found ourselves in Soho’s Ducksoup.

You’ll find Ducksoup on the south end of Dean street, very close to the Groucho club (another Marx brothers’ reference.)

Inside Ducksoup is plainly decorated and is perhaps towards the claustrophobic side of cosy. To my mind it looks like a whitewashed basement that much to its surprise has found itself above ground.

The staff were pleasant and engaged and directed us to our table at the front of dining room. It was here that the DDC suffered her first and perhaps only disappointment of the evening, they’d already sold out of oysters. Whilst we were choosing our food, we were introduced to the wine board. Rather than having a boring old printed list, here as the wines change so frequently they’re written daily onto a blackboard.

Ducksoup prides itself on their range of natural wines. I must admit I didn’t ask them what they meant by natural wines, but just nodded along. One thing I do know now about natural wines is that they are naturally expensive with many options being over £30.

We chose a red wine from Veneto in Italy, which as described as lively and tasted almost effervescent when poured. At £34.50 it was more than I’d usually pay for a wine whilst dining out, but I wasn’t paying so hey ho and it was nice. The bottle even looked suitably rustic, with the sort of cap you’d associate more with those old-fashioned Coke bottles. The DDC being naturally curious did a Vivino search on the wine and the mark up wasn’t as much as I’d have thought.

Ducksoup is one of those places that encourages you to share your food, and the dishes are best described as sharing plates of varying sizes. I did have to feel sorry for my companions at that point as sharing with Rob is a bit of an oxymoron, though I do at least allow them to look at the food.

The sharing plates come a s 5 smaller options and a similar number of larger ones. As there were 3 of us, 2 big, 2 small and a side dish were deemed to be sufficient quantity for sating us. For the small dishes we had salted cod’s cheeks with padron peppers & seared beef with tomatoes. The larger plates were a pork rump with bobby beans, which elicited a chuckle from the QOW and lambs’ leg with rice. The single side dish was a hispi cabbage with tahini sauce.

The dishes were served in succession, with the cod’s cheeks and peppers coming first. These were delicious, salty and tangy with a lovely counterpoint of zestiness from the padron peppers. The seared beef was reminiscent of a deconstructed corned beef hash without the potatoes. It was good and again had good strong flavours.

The pork with bobby beans was nice, but the stand out dish was probably the lamb which tasted a fresh as meadows after a spring rain with a nice light risotto. I’m not a fan of tahini, as to me it tastes like ground up biscuits but my companions both rated the cabbage highly, so I feel honour bound to report that.

To me each individual dish tasted great, but as another friend who has dined at Ducksoup has said they are perhaps a bit over salted. This means that each dish tastes like a climax and having four in succession is perhaps a climax too many as the actress said to the bishop.

We were rushing to the theatre and so didn’t have time for pudding, but I have to say that they and the select choice of cheese both looked excellent. Unusually for a review I have no idea what the final bill was, but I’d guess about £140 excl service.

This was a great birthday treat, and the food here is worth a journey. I would say though that for repeat visits perhaps go for a bit more light and shade. Have some more vegetables, water and perhaps a sweet. My compliment is that I hope I find another excuse for visiting rather than having to wait another decade for a birthday.

https://www.ducksoupsoho.co.uk

Rob