Baring gifts: the lunch deal here might be one of the best in the capital
(Picture: Matt Writtle)Not to sound like Downton’s Dowager Countess belatedly discovering the existence of weekends but, lately, I have been reacquainting myself with the joys of a bargain restaurant deal. Lebanese lunchtime specials that barely breach a tenner. “Kids eat free” lures scrawled on the chalkboards of rural pubs. Flagrant abuse of Dishoom’s bottomless chai. Everyone apart from the shareholders of energy companies continues to feel an especially vicious and prolonged financial pinch. But I’d say that, from where I’m standing, one of the more positive by-products of this crisis (if you are fortunate enough for restaurant dining to still be a possibility) has been the lifting of a collective haze around hospitality spending; a citywide awakening to the light violence of eight quid pints of IPA and an acknowledgement — written in hyped desi pubs, endless food halls and old school caff lust on Instagram — that budget-consciousness and brilliance are not mutually exclusive concepts.
Which just about brings us to The Baring: a fancily appointed new backstreet pub in Islington where, a little while ago, I found myself looking down at what may well be one of the best rotating lunch deals in the city. On this day it was a thick, luscious fillet of pork collar, masterfully seared and seasoned, beside a sharp clump of fennel slaw and a wakame miso mayonnaise. That it cost £12 (or £15 with a glass of house wine) for this level of composed excellence felt like it might have been a typo. And while it’s a piece of pricing that’s admittedly an outlier in the broader context of the menu here (regrettably, this is very much £7 pint country) I am leading with it because it’s instructive about the wider successes of this partnership between chef Rob Tecwyn and GM Adam Symonds. The Baring has both old-fashioned generosity of spirit and a nimble, timely progressiveness. Theirs is a policy of “if it feels good, do it”, touched by the kind of dazzling execution that prompts big smiles, fingers swiped through sauces and wordless grunts of deep, deep pleasure.
