8 | April 11, 2015 | cambridge-news.co.uk | Cambridge News
Food Review
Weekend reviews restaurants anonymously and pays for meals
Pint Shop more than lives up to the hype Pint Shop, 10 Peas Hill, Cambridge, CB1 3PN
Telephone: (01223) 352293 Website: pintshop.co.uk Restaurant opening hours: Monday-Thursday & Sunday: noon-11pm Saturday: noon-midnight Cost: Dinner for two people, including drinks, came to £62.40. Food: 刂刂刂刂刂 Service: 刂刂刂刂刂 Atmosphere: 刂刂刂刂刂 Value: 刂刂刂刂刂
‘The best meal I’ve eaten in Cambridge in a very long while’, says ELLA WALKER.
I
don’t like getting my hopes up. It’s a dangerous business that almost always ends in disaster. Despite my best efforts though, by the time I’d finished breakfast the morning of my first dining trip to the Pint Shop, I was already well and truly stuck into memorising the menu. Over a sad lunch of couscous, I daydreamed extensively about lamb shoulders and brisket and roast pears, and by the time I hit that 4 o’clock slump, the only words triptrapping round my brain were: GIN, ELDERFLOWER and, erm, more GIN. Trying to suppress all giddily unrealistic thoughts of deep fried pork belly (it’s never as good as you hope), we snuck into the nicely gloomy Peas Hill establishment on a freezing Wednesday night to be engulfed by chatter (good luck ever finding a table in the bar), and surrounded by a clientele all doused in a soft, secretive golden light that makes everyone look at least 15 per cent more attractive than they did out on the street. So far, so good. Our table wasn’t quite ready, so, to the drinks menu. They might have every locally-crafted beer and ale available, but I suggest you plump straight for gin, namely the Hard Lemonade (£6.50 each). Portobello Road gin, house lemonade and elderflower – I’d have downed three immediately had we not been shimmied up a grand staircase and nudged into a window seat with a view out over the Arts Theatre (excellent for people watching). Candlelight flirted with shadows that hummed about the Farrow&Ball
walls, our bags very much enjoyed the floorboards (wooden floorboards that smooth they just wanna be stroked), and then water – unasked for, always a perk – arrived and I could finally, FINALLY, order the deep fried, beer battered pork belly (£6). And, you’ll be pleased to hear, after hours of hopeful daydreaming and more than a year of saying: “I really must eat at the Pint Shop,” I ate, no, devoured it; loved it, and wished I’d ordered four platefuls and sat there all night, face smeared with moreish homemade fruity brown sauce, clothes covered in crinkly snippets of batter. Good lord, it was delicious. And I don’t use that word lightly. So good in fact I couldn’t but help feel a little bad. My boyfriend Sam’s smoked duck and spiced chestnuts, paired with a wobbly sloe gin jelly
(£7.50), was lovely, but half the size, and two thirds the tastiness, of mine. Benevolently, I shared. . . sigh. And now he owes me. With a pause between courses to sneak glances at whatever everyone else was eating (food envy is a serious problem here), and to repeat the words “Wow, that was good” roughly six times, our mains appeared. Mine, slivers of medium rare steak – soft in the middle, beautifully charred on the outside – bathed in gravy juice and topped with a too small pile of burnt shallots (give me more!), was dangerously good (£14). Although a mushroom ‘ketchup’ didn’t pack all that much mushroom flavour. On the side I went for the triple cooked potatoes, swimming in a truffle cheese sauce (£3) – firstly because who doesn’t love crisped
up roasties? And second, because every single person I’ve ever spoken to who’s previously eaten at the Pint Shop has gone gooey over them. They were another level of crispiness, but I have to say, the truffle sauce was a bit rich after a few mouthfuls. . . I should have had the purple sprouting broccoli and toasted almonds to cut through it all. Next time, more greens. The palette is as brown and beige as the décor at times. Sam’s beef and pickled walnut pie with parsley mash (£12.50) was a meaty, pastry master class, sweet and deep and nutty, but there was certainly no parsley in that mash. By the time it came to dessert my gluttonous side had been beaten into submission, so, although very tempted by a chocolate and salted caramel concoction, we both went for ices from local boy Jack’s Gelato. Sam’s rhubarb sorbet was incorrectly labelled, because it was definitely ice cream, but it was fresh and bright, just like the accompanying rhubarb jelly (£2.90). My lemon ice cream was super creamy, the lemon curd cushion it sat on, tart (a tad too tart) and very sunny (£3.50). I have to say, it’s the best meal I’ve eaten out in Cambridge in a very long while. It was mostly down to the food, which proves British grub can be warming, hearty, decadent and clever, (and the gin, oh, the gin), but the whole thing wouldn’t work at all if the staff weren’t so sublime, flitting in and out of focus in lumberjack garb as though barely there. It turns out sometimes it’s ok to get your hopes up after all.