I've long since wanted to try out one of Fergus Henderson's joints but have chickened out at the idea of eating at a place that revels in the grizzly bits of the animal. Over the years though I've learned to love liver and savour sweetbreads so the time is right. This place also came highly recommended by the loud mouth offalophile Anthony Bourdain at a recent book launch so the stars aligned and we made our booking.
First impressions were good, I felt like I was walking into an abbatoir with stark white walls, stone flooring and wooden furniture minimising the chintz factor. The dining room was packed with happy looking diners all chowing down on various plates of meat. Our eyes widened when we saw a whole suckling pig being paraded out to one of the private rooms but our hearts sank when we learned that we'd have to give a weeks notice to get that.
Undeterred we ordered up some spratts, langoustines and a brown shrimp dish. Pretty conventional so far. Our mains were somewhat disappointingly conventional with not a chitterling or a sweetbread in sight. We picked a roast Middlewhite, a great rare breed pork that is woefully underrated. Perfect for roasting, it reminded me exactly what roast pork should taste like with a sweetness to the flesh that is missing from the rubbish you get in the supermarkets. The calves liver and mashed swede was meltingly gorgeous and was the pick of the carnivores at the table. The saddle of rabbit was disappointing, a little dry and tasteless. Venison offal was the fourth main course and was pretty good, if a little unremarkable but the red cabbage side dish bought memories flooding back, it isn't something you get that freely in the US where I live.
We were still disappointed at the lack of really interesting dishes on the menu and were considering dessert when our proximity to the kitchen really paid off. The specials board had grown a new item, the suckling pig we'd seen paraded before us had obviously yielded some leftovers so we made this a really Roman feast and ordered it up.
Curiously I had managed to live my life so far without ever tasting genuine suckling pig. Suckling Pig is rare because there are strict rules that govern it's classification. It has to be under six weeks old and only fed on it's mothers milk. Wow. Where have you been all my life Suckling Pig? Obviously it tastes like pork but all of the flavours are amplified, the sweetness, the richness and the tenderness all turned up to 11. I can't actually think of superlatives to describe the crackling so I'm not going to try. Suffice to say if you are making a trip to St. John, don't gamble on there being leftovers, make the order. You will thank me.
After 3 starters, 5 main courses, a bottle of rather nice Northern Rhone red (perfect with the meat festival) you'd think we would be sated and have no room for dessert. Had there not been home made Eccles Cakes with Mrs Kirkham's famous Lancashire on the menu that would be the case, but I couldn't resist. Alarmingly they had sold out and I had to resort to an excellent, rib stickingly rich and sticky ginger cake.
This really is a foodie destination and that you should not overlook. I was a little disappointed in the convention offered by the menu but it does change daily depending on what is seasonal. I shall be making a return trip to what I suspect will become one of my favourite restaurants.