Are you familiar with the sport Shag, Marry, Kill? Three candidates — customarily people, though the rules don’t dictate it — must be shuffled into one of the three lanes, no overlap permitted. The more alike the nominees, the harder the distinction, the more fun is had. Oh, you get it. You probably think you invented it, you minx.
Anyway, my pal (and esteemed colleague) Clare Finney recently advanced the idea that were people to apply the form to everyday situations — shopping for shoes, say, or picking a movie — they might more easily decipher what they truly want, which either makes her an organisational genius or a kind of perverted Marie Kondo, depending on how you look at it. But come on, can you think of a better way to land on somewhere to lunch?
So we found a test bed — behave — on Dean Street. Doppo, hitherto unknown to us and hence neutral, became our Switzerland of restaurants, although presumably it isn’t profiteering off looted Nazi gold. Neutral to look at, too — two neat squares over two floors of plain white walls, parquet floor, not flash but with a certain quiet elegance.
Seduction began slowly. And bafflingly: never have I ever been to an Italian restaurant — or bar, or coffee shop, for that matter — that didn’t have at least a little vermouth to hand. With martinis not an option (“Kill!” my head screamed, “Release the hounds!”), substitutes arrived as a gin and tonic, and vodka over ice. Substitutes arrived, but it was a close-run thing: “All I can think about, and I suspect I’ll be thinking about this for years,” Finney wrote me afterwards, “is how long it took to make our drinks.” I’m not saying you should arrive with a hipflask, but I’m not saying you shouldn’t.
But just as not every great relationship starts with love at first sight — though I’d wager every great affair does — Doppo began to quicken and woo. Mind you, aphrodisiac oysters may have helped — briny little flirts still with all their puckering saltwater, fresh from the West Mersea coast a couple of hours away. A similarly well-sourced octopus tentacle was pointing defiantly upwards, propped on a little toasted barley and bright-tasting thanks to a rock pool of pickled lemon. Small, but, well, write your own jokes.
Later were two thick cylinders of monkfish, skin tan, flesh marble white. A ford of tarragon-spotted beurre blanc divorced them, but across the plate was cauliflower laying with Hen of the Woods. “I’d marry that,” Finney said. “Luxurious enough to keep me furnished with Champagne, nourishing enough to keep me alive.” Pici pasta with a Tuscan-style sausage offered less promise, but perhaps I’m bitter as the final whip of it, as if knowing this was the last dance, whirled around and kissed my face with Chianti-spiked sauce. Later, in the mirror, I momentarily panicked that my nose had begun to rust. But double-crossing pasta be damned. This is a restaurant of mostly light, elegant cooking done with a sureness of touch, a certainty of purpose. When a restaurant is confident, it is easy to have confidence in it.
An octopus tentacle was pointing defiantly upwards, propped on a little toasted barley. Small, but, well, write your own jokes
Mind you, a good wine list always helps; Doppo may not be coquettish with the cocktails, but wine is really its thing — though it doesn’t bore on too much and the 400-long list isn’t a lecture, and leans into its vintages. Muscadet from the Loire with a little age on it, marked up a little under three times, sated; more adventurous types will find room to try new things. Given we’ve got into money — often cause for a relationship rough patch — I tend to assume places with a telephone number but no website will come in cheaply. Not so here; the bill was standoffish, but £6 potatoes will do that. Perhaps the lack of website is all part of its mystique.
Sure, perhaps. But now you’re wondering: go on, the theory, which was it? And all I can say is, me and Doppo, I don’t think we’re a life-long thing, though I certainly wouldn’t wish its demise any time soon. It’s easy to admire, respect and like, but it wasn’t love. So now we’re casual. But enough! I know what I said, but I’m starting to get queasy. I wonder what the therapist is going to make of all this. Speaking of — Christ, don’t use the S/M/K principle to pick one of them.
