Previous SlideNext Slide

Porcine could be mistaken for an ordinary French bistro. The space has a simple charm: polished wood floors, smouldering brick fireplace and casual (though attentive) service. But what ordinary bistro serves the bone-crushing 1890s duck dish, canard a la presse, tableside?

Chef Nik Hill’s approach to French cooking unearths and painstakingly innovates upon the culinary archive. Moules marinieres become memorable with plump, briny mussels on thick slices of warm buttered bread. A ballotine is made of ocean trout, the gently roasted fillet encircling a mousseline made of its belly, bathed in a decadent butter sauce of lobster and Espelette pepper.

And, of course, there is pork: the dry-aged, roasted neck of a Duroc pig sticky with house-made beer honey and served with a herbaceous choucroute.

This is fun eating, and the bonus of drink-in wine from downstairs bar and bottleshop P&V only makes it funner.