Trullo, madly, deeply let-down

Maybe the simple rule in London is go for top end restaurants with wonderful service and perfectly assembled dishes with stratospheric prices or go to a trusty local place where the food will be excellent and the prices fair. Everything in between seems to disappoint and Trullo was a perfect example of this. Slap-dash service lasted all evening and from the very start I felt like we were being rushed. Our waitress was ok but inept and three times asked me if we'd chosen our wine when it was perfectly clear we were still studying the list. Our quail antipasti was ok, my beef shin pasta was very good but not remarkable and was just chucked on the plate and my liver main course was pretty good but again was plonked onto the plate without any care.

The wines were very good and we have to say the price is very good considering three bottles of wine plus desert wine but the whole experience was rushed and amateurish

I say 5/10.

Fuming in the rain !

So there we were "Up the Junction" sipping our digestifs having been turfed out of Trullo's at 9.15 pm. Our measily 2 hour slot was over ! Are their overheads really so high or is it just plain greed ? Either way, it left an unpleasant after-taste. Anyway, to return to the beginning. We started with an excellent bottle of Prosecco DOC Treviso Spumante Bedin. What a joy to be reunited with our dear diners, Su and To for another gastronomical experience, or so we thought in the light of Trullo's many complimentary reviews! Sadly, we were to be very disappointed. What a mediocre meal ! My pile of deep fried squid with its sauce "rosso" was a very plain little dish. This was followed by a weary-looking grilled whole mackerel which shared a plate with a pile of beetroot quarters. Equally uninspired. The butter pastry on my pear tart was lovely but the rest of it was just too bland. Failure to care is unforgiveable and so is being made to feel that we needed to be out of there for much of the time that we were there ! 3.5/10

Overated

Oh how one yearns for the days of yore, when one could get together with friends in a restaurant and linger over a meal! Today's requirement for two sittings means that one feels rather hurried and anxious, a feeling exacerbated by waiting staff who "need that table by 9.30".

A lot has been written about Trullo's good value for money (small mark-ups on wine, ungreedy pricing) and it's exceptional 'River Cafe' style food. I'm afraid that we found it rather uninspiring.
A promising start to the evening when we shared an excellent bottle of prosecco in this unpretentious and pleasant room, served by a charming and attractive waitress, gave way to disappointment with both the food and service. We ordered a mixture of antipasti and starters, but the waitress got confused and brought us four dishes but not my pasta dish. When this finally came, it was the wrong dish and had to be changed. Our main courses all came together, but none of us were particularly smitten with them.

I had a fresh tagliatelle with chanterelles - the fungi flavour all but masked by the heavy butter and parmesan sauce. This was followed by a veal T-bone overcharred on the grill which meant it just tasted burnt, seved with a quite nice mixture of what I think was red cabbage and potatoes.
Su and I shared a cheese plate which was fine, but served unaccountedly with two quite horrible and inedible grissini - we had to ask for some bread!
The bottles of Gavi and Sicilian Donnafugata were lovely, as was the pudding wine.

I'm afraid the perennial affliction of so many restaurants sadly applies - namely poorly trained service staff (this despite the presence of a young man who was previously, and improbably, front of house at River Cafe). On our visit, the much-trumpeted 'fresh, good quality ingredients simply served' left us sincerely underwhelmed, and in one instance (the salmoriglio sauce with plaice) seriously faulty.

One gives a mark for the overall experience, and I'm sorry but it's a 4/10.

The Bill

trullo disappointing

It may not be wise to blog while still digesting and under the influence, but sadly I do not think time will do Trullo any favours. In a word: disappointing.

Beautiful though our waitress was, the service was patchy, at times thoroughly incompetent, and the food decidedly mediocre. My squid and chilli salsa was ok, but disappointingly bland. My fish (plaice with wilted chard and some strange herb) positively weird and strangely perfumed with something which tasted like it should be added to bath water, not food. The cheese platter was OK, but not enough for two, and arrived without bread.

We were hustled out of our seats at 9.15, into the pouring rain and because of this I give it 4 as opposed to the 5 it probably deserves, out of 10.

Last minute blog......

Well a refresher night out in Bruno Loubet, a couple of months after Ju-Ti-Su-To's lovely evening there helped refresh my memory and confirm my initial view that this is a special place. The room is lovely and somewhat quirkyly furnished, and the staff welcoming and very attentive.

The cocktails got us off to an excellent start and we settled into our very well positioned table, with an excellent view of the both the kitchen (complete with the chef at work) and the room filled with happy diners. My asparagus was simple, fresh, subtly seasoned and perfectly cooked. I followed with a rich, dark, fulsome lamb shoulder, and completed my meal with an even richer, darker intensely choclately, chocolate tart and a well chosen (by the somelier) glass of desert wine.

Yes, we are back on track. 8.5 out of 10.

Zetter's couldn't be better

Greeted in charming and friendly style by a very handsome waiter, Ti and I sit down to cocktails in comfortable armchairs upholstered in classy French textiles. The dining room is light and airy, it already seems to exude a kind of quiet confidence. Su and To arrive and pretty soon we are installed at our table where a most charming waitress is taking us through the menu; she describes the ingredients so vividly that you can almost taste them as she speaks. My "revised" Lyonnaise salad is a melange of crispily fried batons of piggy bits on a bed of leaves with a red wine vinaigrette; a very fine starter and a very superior combination of textures and flavours. However, the quail and pistachio dodine with spinach and egg yolk raviolo which follows can only be described as a paragon of excellent cuisine; every mouthful was a treat. Part of the bird breast has been removed and turned into a kind of delicious nut based stuffing which complements the rest of the meat perfectly. The raviolo provides a delicate and wafer-thin little pouch for its spinach based stuffing. Pudding is a disappointment; I plump for the yogurt mouse with passion fruit and ginger Lamington. It's the latter element which bewitches me; it's an Australian thing the Lamington and it brings back happy memories of Oz. But this Lamington just doesn't deliver; it's neither very gingery nor that light and the mousse is a bit dull. I need more intensity. Happily, Su invites me to share some of her chocolate tartlet which is pretty fantastic. It goes down a treat with the glorious Monbazillac. Throughout the meal, the open kitchen is humming quietly in the distance. This is a restaurant that knows what it's doing; mixing the classic French with the novel to excellent effect. Lovely food in a fine surroundings.
9/10