London’s having a love affair with restaurants disguised as holidays.
There’s the buzzy pavement sprawl outside Tollington’s, where punters flock to stand around mirrored bistro tables for sardines in the sun. There’s Agora, where the scent of souvlaki floats out of wide-open windows into Borough Market. And now, there’s Goldies, a wood-fired restaurant from the Blanchette team that allows you to sit in a sheltered courtyard with a tray full of golden chips and a glass of Picon bière, and feel that – if you really squint – you’re sitting in a little Mediterranean square somewhere.
That square is, in fact, Kingly Court, where Goldies sits on the ground floor in a rosy-hued hull whose giant concertina doors give the impression of flowing into the main courtyard itself. Each wall speaks to the restaurant’s interests: a library of interesting-looking wines; a stack of shelves loaded with colourful pickles and cascading greenery; and at the back; the open kitchen, lined with sizzling grills and a bespoke circular chip fryer brought all the way from Holland. That’s also where you’ll find the best seats in the house: stools facing onto the kitchen, separated only by a candlelit formica countertop.
As soon as you walk into the place, you’ll be hit by the menu. Not physically, we should add. But the air is laced with char and flavour; you’ll probably be able to pick out the chef’s signature dish of grilled squid. The second thing to hit you, as you peruse the menu, is how surprisingly affordable it all feels (for a restaurant in Central London, at least). The idea is to get maybe two dishes per person, which you can do for just over £20 a head – oh, and, inevitably, a tray of Goldies frites.
These frites deserve their own paragraph. Crisped up in either beef dripping or vegetable oil, they are the fries of nostalgic holiday dreams: slender, pale, sporting the perfect ratio of crisp to fluffy. They’ll arrive on a massive aluminium tray, acting as a kind of palette cleanser that you can return to throughout your meal – and don’t forget to order a couple of sauces to dip into. The Samurai had a nice hit of spice to it, while the Andalusia was fragrant, sweet and peppery.
Chips aside, it’s onto the wood-fired dishes – and there’s so much to recommend here. That squid is rightfully the chef’s signature; smoky, firm and drizzled in a sprightly za’atar and herb dressing. The BBQ corn ribs are simultaneously perked up and mollified by Café de Paris butter. The grilled wild mushrooms and blackened baby leeks, a beautiful tangle of nature on the plate, sit in a stubbornly fudgy pool of confit egg yolk. And special mention has to go to the grilled baby gem salad, which might sound meek on the menu but arrives with the bravado of mouth-puckeringly salty anchovies; a cloak of tangy Caesar dressing; and fat curls of parmesan.
Try not to get too carried away, though, because the pièce de résistance might just be the dessert. It’s a lone, giant profiterole: a big, planetary orb of sweet choux pastry filled with vanilla soft serve, lavished with molten chocolate and a shower of chopped hazelnuts. It’s utterly gorgeous. Treat yourself.
You’re on holiday, after all.
NOTE: Goldies is open daily – head here to make a booking.
Goldies | Kingly Court, Carnaby, W1B 5PW
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