BONES DADDIES, BERMONDSEY

Ramen and Japanese restaurant Bone Daddies (who have two Central London restaurants - Soho and High Street Kensington, with a third branch in Old Street coming soon) have opened a Saturday-only restaurant in Bermondsey at their test kitchen site. From 12pm to 10pm every Saturday you can get tequila cocktails, homemade cider, mind blowing starters and delicious ramen with a side serving of pumping music in a tunnel on an industrial estate.

I headed along to the slightly difficult to find venue last Saturday to check it out, drink all the cocktails and eat all the food with Polly. Starting with (several) frozen yuzu margaritas - tequila, yuzu and lime, agave, orange liqueur. I never read the full ingredient list of the cocktails when we were at the pop up, and reading it now explains a lot! I blame my slightly debauched afternoon state on those delicious, citric, icy numbers!

 

Food was very much on the agenda too luckily. We ordered four of the eight starters (skipping the sushi/sashimi as I'd eaten lots of raw fish the night before) and loved all of them. We started with tenderstem broccoli with yuzu kosho mayo - perfectly cooked broccoli but the star of the show was that mayo - so light with a crisp, yuzu taste through it, it clung to the ends of the broccoli branches.

 

 

The famous Korean fried chicken wings that were sweet and sticky and heavenly. Not spicy as I thought they'd be but absolutely finger licking good.

Sweet spicy pig bones (pleeeease just call them ribs!) with sweet chilli, soy and sesame. The soft meat just fell off the ribs.

Wild soft shell crab with a green chilli and ginger sauce. Again the sauce here really elevated the dish. It had a real kick to it and cut through the already quite light batter on the crab.

 

Now, I know it's said that Bone Daddies do the best ramen in London, but I think I actually preferred the starters. All the food was super tasty but I felt the starters were on another level. Having said that, I did still enjoy the ramen. We ordered two to share (they gave us smaller portions as we'd already eaten a lot, so don't worry, if you go then you'll get their regular sized portions!) We had the T22 ramen - mustard leaf, onion, nori, chicken, cock scratchings and chicken bone broth. This was Polly's favourite, mine was the spicy miso ramen. The broth was so rich, and the bits of green lift the dish.

 

 

I preferred the spicy miso ramen - pork neck chashu, padron peppers, sesame oil and chicken bone broth. I loved the spring onions in the broth, and the egg was so decadent and delicious, and I found it less sweet than the T22, so more to my taste. 

 

You'll find Bone Daddies Bermondsey at Units 27 & 28 Old Jamaica Business Estate, 24 Old Jamaica Road, SE16 4AW on Saturdays from 12pm-10pm. I know I said it's tricky to find, but Citymapper got me to the right place so just follow that!!