Roe, Canary Wharf restaurant review by Abbie Park, Head Chef, Jimmy Garcia Catering
If Grace Dent in The Guardian refers to a restaurant as "kind of mad, but also sheer bloody genius," you know you’ve got to pay a visit. That’s exactly what the Jimmy Garcia Catering kitchen team did this week when they dined at Roe, the second incarnation of the hugely popular Fallow in St James’s, and now their new restaurant in Canary Wharf. Abbie Park, our Head Chef, reports.
The kitchen team visited Roe restaurant this week, and we were truly treated! The style of the restaurant is quite casual and moody, with dimmed lighting and an open show kitchen. Their 3D-printed coral reef walls and overhead table lighting, which give the appearance of bubbles, make you feel as though you are underwater.
The first thing to notice upon arrival is the aeroponic wall that yields some of the fresh produce the chefs use throughout the menus. Even the Padron peppers are grown in-house! We were then led past the open kitchen to our round table, complete with a lazy Susan, which was ideal for the sharing menu style.
The menu was concise enough not to be overwhelming while also offering a lot of variety. We ordered a selection of snacks and small plates to start, and they were brought to the table as and when they were ready, with little nods to the restaurant’s brand on their tableware, which was a nice touch.
The smoked cod’s roe was a menu highlight straight from the off. So simple, but the flavour really stood out. The breaded mushrooms with kombu and garlic mayonnaise were also a hit, even with the non-mushroom eaters!
The maitake Cornish pasty with walnut ketchup is definitely worth a try as such an unusual combination, although I would have preferred a toning down of the sour notes in both the ketchup and pasty.
A personal highlight, and I think all of the chefs would agree, was the cuttlefish fried toast with pork skin. Roe’s take on a traditional prawn toast packs so much more of a punch. It was perfectly fried without being greasy, while still maintaining a strong flavour of the cuttlefish. You knew what you were eating! And the pork skin added an almost crackling-type layer to the toast—it was just wow! We may be ‘borrowing’ this idea for our own menus!
The venison tartare was probably the least favourite of the dishes from the chefs, as the laab dressing was so citrusy you couldn’t really tell what meat you were eating.
We moved on to a selection of skewers and flatbreads, which, with their interesting flavour combinations, all the chefs were eager to try. The rare breed pork belly skewers were a hit, with the pork belly being sliced so thinly before marinating that it really did melt in your mouth. Finished with house-made sriracha and crispy pork skin and presented on branded boards, it really elevated the idea of the basic skewer.
We also opted for the octopus and spiced sausage skewer, as well as the chicken wing and Padron pepper. Both combinations worked so well and were really well executed.
The seafood and snail flatbreads had a nice spice to them and were really interesting to eat. Snail vindaloo—who knew! And the chefs used the octopus trim from the octopus skewers on the flatbread to minimise waste, which is a concept that we are really interested in ourselves. The summer vegetable flatbread was so fresh in comparison, a welcome respite from the very strong flavours of the other dishes. I would recommend it to give your taste buds a bit of a break before diving headfirst back in!
Next on the agenda was the Roe mixed grill, the sriracha mussels, and the Jacob’s ladder. By this point in the meal, we were all pretty full, but we powered through as it was so hard to say no! The sriracha mussels were absolutely delicious, but the real star of the show in that dish was the slice of sourdough hiding underneath the mussels, which had soaked up all the flavour. Highly recommended!
And the Jacob’s Ladder dish did not disappoint. The meat is brined, slow-cooked in stock, and then grilled, and it falls off the bone. Served with garlic mayo, mushroom XO sauce (a firm favourite in the JGC kitchen), and pickled chillies, it was everything that we had hoped for.
Although by now we could barely move, we had heard amazing things about the desserts, so we somehow made room. We got the full selection of desserts for the table, including the soft serve and the Black Forest tart; however, the two to really shout about were the Tunworth cheesecake and the banana parfait.
The cheesecake had the strength of the Tunworth cheese but was still perfectly balanced. Paired with the crunchy hazelnut sable, it was so tasty. It was served with Earl Grey ice cream, Earl Grey powder, lemon gel, and sorrel, and it was something to be remembered.
The banana parfait is the essence of Roe on a plate. It is a zero-waste dessert using the whole banana. Even the usually discarded blackened skins of the roasted bananas get sliced, soaked in syrup for 24 hours, and fried for a caramelised crunch on top of the dessert. The banana purée is turned into a mousse, caramel, and jam, and is presented to resemble a banana. It was truly inspired and delicious, and I don’t even like bananas!
We rolled out of Roe feeling really spoiled and satisfied. The atmosphere was casual while still feeling as though you were being truly treated. The service was attentive, and the servers were knowledgeable without being too formal. And the food was really well executed and delicious. The chefs have taken favourite, recognisable dishes and put their own spin on them, and we were really impressed. Highly recommended.
