Brad Carter and the team at Island.
What can you tell us about Island?
A year ago, Mare Street Market King's Cross opened in what seems to be the ever-growing area to the north of King's Cross station. The main part (before Island opened) was downstairs, where Mare Street serves up its own menu (tacos, burgers, brunch etc). Island has now opened as a separate restaurant within Mare St, billed as a very different kind of surf & turf affair. A key part of its attraction is that it's looked after by a couple of impressive chefs, who are delivering an incredibly strong menu.
Who are those chefs?
More well-known to Londoners is Tom Brown, who had a Michelin-starred restaurant with Cornerstone (those starry efforts are now focused in his Knightsbridge restaurant) and Pearly Queen in Shoreditch. Here at Island he's focused on the "surf" part of the equation, in a style that's probably closer to Pearly Queen in execution. Joining him and new to London is chef Brad Carter, who's been making a big name for himself in Birmingham with restaurants like Carters of Moseley. He's known for a nose-to-tail approach to meat and he's handling the "turf" part of Island's menu. This is his first London restaurant (after parting ways with Undercroft before it opened)
So you have a restaurant that splits its focus between seafood and meat, and which has some of the best chefs known for each in charge.
Just north of King's Cross and right beside the north end of Coal Drops Yard, you'll find Mare Street Market (with Island upstairs).
Where can I find it?
It's about a five to 10-minute walk north of King's Cross Station. Walk past the enormous Google building that seems to be taking forever to build, pass by Granary Square, head out the north side of Coal Drops Yard, and you'll find Mare Street Market right there. Island takes over the top floor of the venue.
Where should we sit?
It's a big old space, with plenty of mini booths that could easily be arranged for larger groups. The room is almost too big, if that's possible, and thanks to a carpet which we say is certainly isn't the one we would have chosen, it has the unfortunate appearance of a mammoth airport restaurant. That's despite a lot of work that has clearly gone into the lighting with dozens of chandeliers across the ceiling (hence its previous name as the Chandelier Room). It's an odd effect, but it's still one we're letting slide because the food is so excellent.
Honestly, who chose that carpet?
Onto that food, then - what can we expect?
As we've mentioned, surf and turf is the name of the game, as evidenced by a huge neon sign that's part prawn, part cow (you can just see that in the cocktail photo below).
But it's not your standard surf and turf restaurant by any measure. Yes, steak and lobster is on the menu, but even that has a twist. If you are looking for an extremely innovative combo of seafood and meat dishes, often paired extremely well in the same dish, this is the place for you. We're slightly getting ahead of ourselves but this is a very well put-together menu.
It's a small to medium plates sharing-style affair, with the portions of everything we had sitting on the generous side. Here's a taste of some of the snacks and small plates:
Cuttlefish & pig butter fried bread (£12) - Start with this, it's perfect snacking food while you look through the menu.
There are lots of choices for dressed oysters on the menu and, as you'd expect from a man with an excellent oyster bar in Shoreditch, any of them are worth ordering. But really, you have to go for the grilled oysters with a Montgomery cheese sauce (£5.50 each, six for £28). Just fantastic.
BBQ Tamworth pork and brown crab slaw (£14) - An enormous slab of slow-cooked Tamworth that pairs incredibly well with the crab slaw.
We ordered a little tentatively at this stage, because we knew what was coming next. But on the menu, you'll also find dishes like beef tartare paired with prawn crackers (£12), mussels cooked in curry (£12/£20), and a range of skewers like squid & sobrasada (all £12). There is also the more traditional take on surf & turf in a Boston beef chop with lobster bearnaise (starts at £43) or an all-seafood alternative of monkfish with lobster bearnaise (£28).
But really, you want to save yourself for this behemoth:
The Island mixed grill (£65 for two). This should be your go-to main course
This huge platter (it took up pretty much our entire table) features two lamb döner sausages (a recipe from Carter's One Star Doner bar), two prawn stuffed chicken wings, rump oyster steak, two lamb chops in shawarma spice, two hand dived scallops with coral butter, onion & jalepeno salad, and Aleppo grapefruit for squeezing over. The sauces are house hot sauce, mint and laverbread relish, and citrus crème fraiche.
Every element of that mixed grill is wonderful, from the huge scallops to the perfectly cooked chops. All other mixed grills now pale in comparison.
But there are sides too - and these should not be missed, particularly the excellent potatoes:
The roast potatoes are frankly amazing and are almost impossibly crunchy. There's a surf version (cooked in dried mussel, lemon, black pepper & Tajin salt) and a turf version (cooked in beef, onion & oregano salt) so just choose your preference (£8)
The other sides are just as inventive, like this beef tomato panzanella on cod's roe (£9)
Room for dessert after all that?
While the instinct at this point might be to have a lie down somewhere by the canal and get over the food coma, you'll want to leave something in the tank to help you get through desserts. The two we chose below were both easy recommendations, and while there was definitely no meat or seafood in these, the same ingenuity, care and attention in creating them is apparent.
The fried apple and peach pie (£12) is their homage to the McDonald's favourite but about a million times better. The apple and peach also proving a winning combo.
The blueberry cheesecake pudding (£12) is essentually three desserts in one, featuring a baked vanilla rice pudding, cheesecake mousse folded through, English blueberry jam and a bruleed top.
What about drinks?
There's s separate drinks menu to the rest of Mare Street Market, with a mainly European-centric wine list that starts at £33 for a Spanish Verdejo/Tempranillo. It's a short list, but you'll find some interesting stuff on there like an American Albarino (£66) and an excellent Greek Assyrtiko from Myrsini (£57), which worked perfectly for the whole meal. There are also some very now chilled reds on the list.
On the no-alcohol front, there's Lucky Saint and a couple of non alcoholic cocktails. The main cocktails are all priced at £14 and are all a touch above what you'll find downstairs in terms of ingredients and execution, but we're also very much a fan of the retro styling as you see below.
Bloody Islands (Vodka, cherry vine tomato juice, sherry, horseradish, fresh lemon, £14) and the Toasted Colada (Rum blend, roasted pineapple, coconut cream and fresh lime, £14). We love a fancy pina colada, but sometimes you want it presented like a good old-fashioned one - this is the best of both worlds.
Overall thoughts
Bringing together two great chefs, it's fair that expectations were high for Island and they've been more than met. We may not be fans of the room itself, but the cooking on show here was outstanding. Every dish we had was a knockout, and there's so much on there that we need to go back and try next time. This was easily one of the most consistently great meals we've had for a while, and comes with our strong recommendation to check it out.
More about Island
Where is it? King's Cross - Mare Street Market, Lewis Cubitt Square, London N1C 4DY
How to book: Book online
Find out more: Visit their website or follow them on Instagram @island_london.
Hot Dinners ate as guests of Island. Prices are correct at the time of writing.
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