Whyte and Brown

Name - Whyte and Brown

Location - Kingly Court, Carnaby St, London, W1B 5PW

Cost - Moderate range of choices from starters between £5.75 - £7 to main courses between £6.95 - £13.5. You can also choose to add sides that range between £3.25 - £3.95.

Star Appetizer - Southern Fried Buttermilk Chicken Wings

Star Main Course - Chicken Milanese

My Rating - 3/5

Before any of you start to call in the grammar police I must point out that the name is in fact "Whyte", and not "White". Don't ask me why, maybe they just felt like watching the world burn. In any case, here we have one of the most popular chicken joints of Kingly Court, a great place to go on a Friday evening if you're thinking about going out later. Prepare yourselves for smoking hot wings, tender chicken legs and grilled juicy goodness. Here’s a quick link to their website before I carry on - http://whyteandbrown.com/

Be warned, here comes a rant that will probably have the service walking on egg shells for a while. I absolutely hate it when I spend about ten minutes down the phone with a waiter trying to explain how you spell my name, ensuring that the table is booked, and that it is the correct time, only to find that once I arrive they have lost my booking. This plate drop meant that we had to sit in the less than busy cafe area, which wasn’t the end of the world, but I quite fancied sitting in their bustling dining space. It would have been nice of the waitress to offer something in exchange for the mess up, but she made a point of not showing much empathy. The evening was then filled with breaking glasses at the bar, 2 menus between 4 of us, missing forks and knifes, little attention from the waitress and other minor details that only start to become annoying once they stack up. What a bunch of headless chickens... Anyway, nobody wants to listen my squawking, but to sum it up, I was not a happy bunny about the service, and although the atmosphere did hit home with its rustic industrial charm, I was still stuck in the cafe, feeling ready to fly the coop. The one saving grace was the thing that we all come to restaurants for, THE FOOD.

I was very pleased to find that the menu was simple, and highly digestible. There was no faffing about here, just a clean-cut menu that knew its worth. I would say that for the location, and the type of restaurant, it was actually very affordable. Here is a look at their menu - http://whyteandbrown.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Summer-menu.png

After some suggestions from the waitress we decided to go for the following starters:

Caesar Scotch Eggs - A very fresh and gooey inside, with a crispy powdering of bred crumbs covering a very rich chicken layer which also went surprising well with the odd piece of crunchy bacon.

Southern-Coast Crab on Toast - Here we had a truly beautiful marriage of tastes, combining fresh handpicked crab with smashed avocado, juicy tomato and perfectly cut apple matchsticks. The taste of crab infused with these natural condiments was absolutely wonderful, and what a great idea for a sophisticated sandwich. Southern Fried Buttermilk Chicken Wings - Get ready for an American deep fry explosion of taste, because this dish was a bombshell. The sharp taste of the chicken combined with the fiery fried layers made this platter extremely scrumptious, and the garlic lemon mayo provided an added shazam of fresh creamy flavour.

Hot and Sticky Chicken Wings - I must confess that I am not a huge fan when it comes to combining chicken with watermelon. Call me insane, but the wet, icy flavour of a watermelon with the hot, greasy and ultimately robust grilled chicken doesn’t really taste right. A cool yogurt sauce already countered the dryness, so the watermelon actually seemed unnecessary.

The starters were very lovely, the portions were generous and they all had a full-bodied taste. If I am being completely honest though I would have expected a chicken restaurant to produce some of the best chicken I have ever tasted, and although it was good, it wasn’t magnificent. I also suspect that the issue with the watermelon was more of an attempt to include new and exciting alternatives to your average chicken dish. It can of course be quite a challenge to continuously innovate and create new exciting experiences when all you mainly have to work with is chicken. What do you think?

Something that I really liked about the menu was that it offered suggestions for drinks that would go well with each dish. This encourages people go beyond their usual "one beer please" and it actually comes off as helpful, rather than pushy. I am actually surprised by how very few restaurants do this. It is easy for restaurants to forget that the best way to make some extra cash is to push for those extra condiments and drinks, rather than just relying on your main food pallets.

Right, time to go on to the mains! Guess what’s cooking? that’s right, chicken! Obviously we had to add some extra fish and vegetable platters to the onslaught of chicken, otherwise it could all have gotten a bit too clucking much. Here were the main courses that took our fancy:

Twisted Souvlaki fish and king prawn - This dish was a bit lacking in meat and the portions weren’t very good, but having said that, the fish was perfectly cooked and the flat bread combined with the pomegranate, tzatziki and beetroot hummus was a wonderful sprinkle of flavours.

Twisted Souvlaki with chunky vegetable and halloumi - Again, the portions could have been more generous, especially with halloumi being such a simple condiment, but overall the combination of flavours still won me over. No flavour was overpowering, and the halloumi was a natural winner with the flat bread and tzatziki combo.

Chicken Milanese - This was a truly delish dish, with the runny egg delivering a great complementary flavour along with the luscious arrabbiata sauce and melting fontina. The chicken was a tiny bit dry, but on a whole it was definitely a winner.

Beer Can Roasted Half chicken - The slow-roasted half chicken was jam-packed with taste, and the juices combined with the splash of beer added a very interesting twang. I do however have to admit that the sauce was a tiny bit too sharp, and was almost blocking out the taste of the chicken. It was still a great dish, but with one taste taking center stage.

Great Success! I would definitely recommend the two chicken dishes, but would suggest that Whyte and Brown have a look back at their portion control for their Souvlaki.

Chicken, chicken and more chicken. oh, and some fish to break up the taste of course. Whyte and Brown is a healthy marriage between traditional British recipes and more outspoken dishes such the Mediterranean grilled options. It's actually very hard to pull off an "all chicken" offering without falling into the "Nandos" category, but gosh darn it I was extremely happy with this clucking set of dishes. Admitadely they do offer other meats for a reason, but I think it was the combination of old traditional dishes mixed in with some exotic thrills that made this menu more than just... chicken. However, given that they have chosen to specialise in this one area it could be said that each dish needs to be cooked to perfection, and I did actually get some hints of overcooked chicken during my stay. Yes, there is something snooty and ridiculous about picking up on a bit of overcooked chicken, but I also feel that a chef who has probably cooked more chicken than anyone in greater London (except for a Nandos employee) should probably know his stuff. Ultimately I was expecting the chicken here to blow my mind, but it actually came down to a bit of a mixed finish if I am honest. Anyway, here is a rundown of my experience with Whyte and Brown.

Whyte and Brown Checklist:

• Parking - Never park in central London, ever.

• Host greeting - Relatively nice, but not very accommodating.

• Decor - Old rustic industrial and yet modern.

• Server - Made good recommendations, but wasn’t very personal.

• Menu - Simple. Can't go wrong with a bit of chicken.

• Taste - Great mixture of tastes that manage to maintain a unique flavour for each dish.

So what did you think? Would you try this place or would the service make you chicken out? Leave your thoughts, along with your own recommendations in the comments below and maybe I will review one of your restaurants next.

#chicken #whyteandbrown #kinglycourt #restaurantreview #old