Two Figs
5&9 Byres Road,Glasgow,
G115RD
0141 334 7277
Price Ratings
£ – inexpensive
££ – mid-price
£££ – expensive
££££ – very expensive
Reviews
You will give a fig
Review published on 31/08/2009 © Sunday Herald
I wouldn’t normally review a restaurant as soon as it has opened. There’s a tendency among restaurant critics to rush to new places, so as to be up with all the latest openings. Most chefs would rather they held off, leaving space to shake off first-night nerves and allow for things to go wrong – like the kitchen extractor not working, or the butter picking up the smell of new varnish.
There’s a persuasive counter-argument, of course, that if a restaurant is open enough to take the punter’s money, it’s open season to judge it without making any allowances.
On balance, I think that to get a more accurate measure of a place, it’s best to let it bed down a bit. Some places start well and nosedive. Others start shakily then pick up as they get into their stride. A visit four to six weeks after opening is a more reliable guide.
That said, there I was on Byres Road, Glasgow, and noticed that Two Figs, a new enterprise from Catherine Hardy and Jacqueline Fennessy, the duo who gave us the enduringly popular Left Bank on Gibson Street, was open. Well, open-ish. Front-of-house staff were on the pavement outside, assembling flat-pack furniture (rather them than me).
Inside, there were two lonely tables of diners, the odd corner where the velvet or wallpaper wasn’t quite finished, and Hardy and Fennessy, deep in discussion surrounded by a sea of paperwork and half drunk cappuccinos. But Two Figs was, I was confidently informed, properly open. So being inclined to think that any offshoot of the Left Bank would tend to be competent, as a minimum, we sat down to eat, by the window, as it happened. Maybe Byres Road was just lined with fans waiting to see the place open up, or too timid to be the first. Although being Glasgow, the latter possibility seems unlikely. At any rate, by the time we left, the place was rammed and that was only 4.30pm. I have a very strong feeling in my bones that Two Figs will go down a storm.
The hallmark of Hardy and Fennessy’s style is to serve substantial portions of food at extremely reasonable prices.
They achieve this not by trading down on the quality of the ingredients or padding out plates with stodge and a greenhouse of cheap salad, but by being focused on what they serve.
They design intelligent menus that plug into the zeitgeist, and the kitchen, in the capable hands of Left Bank chef Liz McGougan, is assiduous in making every little element of a dish from scratch.
Two Figs is also “on message” with its plant food-centric menu, its sustainable fish, its use of economy cuts of meat and the healthiness of its menu. In case you were worried that they had ditched the brilliant chips you get at Left Bank, let me reassure you. Two Figs’ chips might even be a shade better, if such a thing is possible, being more thickly cut but otherwise retaining all their virtues: twice cooked, floury spuds, a little bit of skin on to deepen the flavour.
A starter of mackerel fillet, its skin grilled to a crisp, then served with a watercress and broad bean salad spiked with beetroot dressing and fresh mint was satisfying enough to make light lunch in itself, but cost only £4.50. Craggy, crunchy croquettes, oozing roasted aubergine, potatoes, parmesan and gruyere, came with a intense sludge of cherry tomatoes: another bargain at £3.95. Both main courses, an original veggie burger (made from chickpea, mushroom, sweet potato and coriander) and Indian summer curry, were clearly painstakingly made with attention lavished on the side components, such as the gloriously fragrant brown basmati rice cooked with tomato and mustard seed. A white chocolate cheesecake managed to taste sharp rather than cloying. The chocolate, fig and hazelnut produced groans of pleasure.
Two Figs has started off with the menu equivalent of a capsule wardrobe. There will doubtless be additions, and I bet they’ll be good.
Waving not drowning
Review published on 29/09/2009 © Sunday Herald
Nine o’clock, Sunday morning. The doorbell rings. Luca, who’s standing at the window, shouts: "Dad, it’s the police." Uh-oh. Could this be a hangover from last night’s party? Curious. The only people who misbehaved at Cal’s 16th were the six year olds, out of their faces on purloined Irn-Bru until they were captured and imprisoned in the house. Or could it be something to do with those pizzas I made?
Okay, I confess. The dough didn’t rise fully on some of them. Well, you try keeping a battered old oven with a dodgy door seal hot for that many pizzas, officer.
Actually, it’s neither. Apparently someone called the police to say my wife’s car tax is a couple of weeks out of date. Welcome to Newlands on the south side of Glasgow. I’m getting out of here and going to the trendy west end, where the sun always shines, the restaurants are always new and the neighbours are too busy tie-dying their sandals to be bothering the rozzers. Where there’s fattoush and lamb shawarma, thalis for breakfast even, and a waiter, noticing I don’t want a coffee as I spread out the papers, bringing me a jug of cool water instead. Nice touch, man. Very nice.
I can’t help feeling there’s a sort of New York ambience to Two Figs with its bare brick walls, remnants of white paint lingering artistically of course, openish kitchen and refreshing absence of irritating students.
I like this place already, so much so that I may hide out here for a couple of days with my bowl of noodles. Yep, that’s all it says on the menu. Noodles – we’re that laidback here – and not any old noodles. They’re tweaked and teased, with greens and sauteed peppers, a hint of sesame oil and a flash of fresh coriander with seeds on top. The effect is to take a fairly ordinary dish and make it better, elevate it, gloss over the vaguely sweet chilli sauce flavour. Add to this a bamboo skewer of lemon-marinated chicken and it’s a nice lunch.
Salt-and-pepper chicken wings come with a heavy crisp batter, a studding of black pepper and perhaps not enough salt. Pre-poaching the chicken southern style may make it more tender, but it’s still a cut above the usual.
The mackerel fillets? Flash fried and reasonably crisp. I love mackerel, and I love these fillets though the broad bean and watercress salad is too fussy and a bit tired looking, plus that beetroot dressing adds nothing except colour.
Is there more? Yes, there’s a clever series of interlocking all-day menus, a long list of fashionable and cross-cultural dishes, but it’s already clear that detail is taken care of in here. And often detail is what it’s all about.
What’s surprising is that the food is coming from one chef working in a tiny open kitchen by the back wall. Even more surprising is that this is a Jonah site for restaurants, with its split dining room and location at the cursed, bottom end of Byres Road. I’ve lost count of the number of places that have opened in here, flourished briefly and then sunk without trace. It’s a dangerous spot, but somehow there’s no feeling of that today. Just a hustle and a bustle and a steady stream of visitors.
Okay, so there’s a sort of fawning enthusiasm about what the owners of Two Figs do, their other venture, The Left Bank, being a west end darling. It doesn’t really do them any favours, raising expectations to a level nobody can meet on a regular basis. It’s enough to know that if you come in here you’ll get a decent meal at a reasonable price and that the standards are pretty much higher than anywhere else around.
Almost more importantly, it’s comfortable and relaxing and the management has a finger firmly on the pulse. If you’re on the run from life it will keep you long entertained. It has me.