Just under a year after she closed her Brixton site, Adejoké Bakare’s Chishuru has finally re-opened in its shiny new Central London location. With all the glowing reviews and awards, the tiny Brixton site became hugely oversubscribed, so with Chishuru 2.0, Bakare is aiming to take it to the next level – and we can confirm she’s knocked it out of the park.
The new site, which is located on Great Titchfield Street, is bigger than the Brixton original but still not huge by any means – there’s a maximum of 55 covers, split across two floors. They’ve done a great job on the space, however, with earthy-toned walls, splashes of light green, modern artworks, and smart spotlights.
On the food front, it’s all very simple: there’s a £65 set menu at dinner and a £35 menu at lunch. Within that you’ll get some starters/snacks, choose your main course from three options, and then finish with a dessert. We went by on the first full night of opening and we were blown away by the dishes we had – each one well balanced and full of flavour. The very first dish of the night was perhaps our favourite, a thick fermented rice cake (Sinasir) topped with white crab meat, pumpkin and sorrel purée. Beautiful, delicate, and bold all at the same time.
We also loved the fiery peppercorn broth, which packed some serious heat and depth. The clear broth was topped with eko, meat floss, kale, and corn tofu, which added great texture and flavour. The final of the three starters was Moi Moi, a bean cake topped with thinly-sliced duck liver, a rich duck egg sauce, and tomato crisp.
Between us, we tried two out of the three main courses, missing out on the meat option which was quail with taro on our visit. We instead went for Egusi, grilled hispi cabbage stuffed with caramelised shallots, utazi leaf, and a superb wild watermelon seed sauce. Next was Mbongo tchobi, cod fillet with a spiced black sauce and wilted greens. The sauces on both mains were particularly impressive and we were thankful for the big bowl of rice served with the mains to soak it all up with. There’s also house pickles and plantain as accompaniments. The menu finishes with Ngalakh, a rice ice-cream, with ginger cream and a dusting of baobab powder, which brings a perfect citrus touch to the dish.
Chishuru is a fantastic restaurant and easily one of the most exciting ‘new’ openings of the year. If you never managed to make it to the original in Brixton, then get along to the new Chishuru sharpish – it won’t be long until getting a table here is impossible too.
3 Great Titchfield St, London W1W 8AX
chishuru.com