‘I want light and healthy’, my dining partner tells me for our planned catch-up. With that in mind, I decided to completely disregard her wishes and the fact she’s just come back from 10 days of face-stuffing, dustbin-lid portions in New York, and booked us into Spuntino - the uber cool, Brooklyn-inspired space in Soho.
Set in the heart of Soho, Spuntino encapsulates everything that’s great about the area. The unassuming exterior with a single red neon sign, hides a buzzing, elbow-touching-ly small bolt hole, crammed with low-key couples. The entire focus of the room is the metal-topped bar, which takes up most of the exposed-brick, unpainted space, with diners on one side, and bar staff dancing, drinking and mixing up cocktails in its centre. It’s a Saturday night in this part of London, so of course the place is rammed with a mash of hip hop and old school blaring out, and frequent walk-ins being turned away.
Inspired by Brooklyn, Spuntino is a communal den of fast, good grub and sharp cocktails.
If you’re looking for a green salad and glass of water, then you’re most probably wasting your time at this sexy nook, but if it’s dribble-down your face, gooey food you’re after, then you might not find better. There’s six sections to the menu, with burgers, sandwiches and desserts, along with a small choice of specials. We kicked things off with Spuntino’s take on green vegetables: battered and fried asparagus, that we dolloped into garlic mayonnaise. Continuing with the theme of deep fried and dirty, a plate of buttermilk fried chicken (£4.50) was devoured in seconds, every bite inspiring choruses of ‘hallelujah’ somewhere up high - so good, we convinced the chef to jot down the recipe on a scrap of paper.
Even the lowly potato is elevated to god-like food as it’s cut into thick chunks and fried three times for their take on chips (£3.60). Both the beauty and the brutishness of the bar is that you can see pretty much everyone’s order, giving a sense of communal guilt as you stuff another piece of bread-crumbed-topped mac n cheese in your mouth, but also inducing serious food envy. We watched as skillets filled with a puffed up Yorkshire pudding were served to our neighbours, only realising too late that we had not ordered the Dutch Baby. Not to worry; Brooklyn Toast (£6) is as sinful, with a dollop of nutella ice cream sandwiched between French toast. Wash it all down with a negroni or three, as the bar stick with strong and alcohol-filled tipples for their cocktail list, most probably to help save room for food.
It's not a Yorkshire pudding... the infamous Dutch Baby.
The DesignMyNight Digest
Spuntino is fun and it’s naughty, in the same way turning up to work drunk after a 3am night out is. The menu is the sort of comfort food that has you seriously considering investing in a deep fat fryer, and best of all, it’s utterly affordable, with most dishes well under a tenner.
