Stray moments of genius: a few of the dishes on Tendril’s set menu
(Picture: Caitlin Isola)There isn’t room here to fully do justice to cauliflower’s dramatic recent turnaround in fortunes. What once was generally staid albino broccoli is now every restaurant chef’s endlessly adaptable lodestar and obsession. It is deep-fried or slow-roasted whole to buttery softness; it is cut into steaks, carefully seared, and anointed with frothing butter like a porterhouse; it is probably close to being so ubiquitous as to be boring in an entirely new way.
However, at Tendril, a largely plant-based restaurant just off Regent Street, chef Rishim Sachdeva does something truly memorable and novel with it. Here, it is roasted to smoky, yielding succulence, surrounded by a creamy moat of delicately spiced coconut milk moilee, and set aboard a hidden sweet potato fritter that provides a face-flushing surge of chilli warmth.
