Should I eat it, or engage in polite conversation?

[major_clanger]

darth_hamster and I are just back from a meal at the St John Restaurant. Unlike Archipelago, where we ate a few weeks ago and which specialises in conventional bits of unusual animals, St John specialises in making use of all bits of the animals on the menu. Mind you, there's a bit of unconventional stuff too; I've not seen cuttlefish offered up for a good while. There will probably be a more comprehensive review later, but I'll note that not only is the food excellent, but if you manage (as we did) to sit next to a large group who ordered in advance you get the entertainment of watching them tackle whole crab followed by suckling pig - including head. Not cheap, but highly recommended if you are emphatically carnivorous and don't mind the prospect of dinner looking at you.

Comments

[watervole]

I like the concept of not wasting any of the animal. We used to eat things like tripe and heart when I was young, and I enjoyed both of them - never see them for sale now.

[major_clanger]

Tripe was on the menu, as was marrow (served in the bone; a nearby table ordered it and you get special spoons to dig it out with.)

I've had stuffed lamb heart before and it was delicious; I must try doing it for dinner some time.

A game of squeal and judgement

[hairyears]

I have yet to succeed in getting a table in St.John's: must try harder.

The clientele, I'm told; are very much 'Old City'.

Re: A game of squeal and judgement

[major_clanger]

We certainly had to book six weeks in advance to get a table at a weekend evening. Having said that, the clientele last night were a fairly mixed bunch of the sort one might expect in a moderately expensive restaurant, but I can imagine the weekday evening crowd would be a bit more as you describe.

(The patron who I recall was the hipster with a short mohican a couple of tables away; what caught my eye about him though was the cardboard box on the floor next to him that was factory-labelled MAGIC PROP ITEM, SIZE MEDIUM.)

[brixtonbrood.livejournal.com]

You obviously ate early, because you were posting this just as we were walking into the bar with M&P after going to Einstein at the Barbican. We had skate and tripe (not in the same dish).

[desperance.livejournal.com]

We went to St John a few years back. Brains, bone marrow and chitterlings: I was in offaly heaven.