[title]
Descending into the gloom of Temper Shoreditch’s basement restaurant is like entering a cult club night. Thudding disco and raucous chatter envelop you as you walk in from Great Eastern Street straight downstairs into a dark, smoky, neon-lit subterranean world. But instead of a DJ, the star of the show here is a huge smoldering fire pit that takes pride of place behind open bar seating.
The fourth restaurant in the Temper family, the Shoreditch incarnation of these steakhouse and barbeque spots is cut from the same cloth as its older Soho sibling (there are two other joints in Bank and Covent Garden). It has the same pitch-black walls and ceilings and illuminated fridges full of glistening slabs of raw steak. Like the W1 spot, hunks of charring meat hanging over the glowing coals are visible across the restaurant floor in various blackened states, sending scents of searing fat into the air. Every now and then a rush of flames erupts as the chefs flambé smoking cuts of meat. It’s wonderfully theatrical and flashy – something that feels straight from the mind of a gout-ridden Tudor king.
In fact, the concept was the brainchild of restauranter Sam Lee and chef Neil Rankin who founded the mini-chain. Rankin’s since left and now David Lagonell heads up the menu. While the restaurants still pride themselves on butchering steaks in-house from rare breed cattle, it’s moved on from each site having its own specialism (Soho concentrated on tacos; the City site on curry). Now they share the same menu which means there’s a confusing cacophony of flavours on offer.
There are some gems in the mix. The pork rib – snackable bites of succulent meat and chewy fat lathered in a stick-to-your-ribs sweet and sour sauce – makes your tongue dance. The burnt squash is soaked with charcoal flavours and layered with a tick swipe of tangy mole sauce. The tacos are soft and moreish filled with saucy goat meat and pleasantly salty miso tuna and smokey-sweet pineapple. There are some misses: an unmemorable jollof rice and an ill-thought-out prawn green curry which is paired with soft taco shells that disintegrate in the hot liquid before you can snaffle them up. But, all these are warm-up acts to the headliner: a gargantuan plate of 60-day aged Aberdeen Angus T-bone steak. It arrives cut up into juicy pink chunks with an impressive (if rather phallic-looking) bone towering over the plate. It’s wolfed down worryingly easily.
One of the main draws of this new temper is the cocktail bar above. All sexy bachelor pad vibes with bare brick walls, soft lighting and mustard yellow booths, it’s a little haven away from the meaty smoke below, which reached full club night mode when a couple started violently snogging over their steak on a table across the room. The bar’s cocktail menu is full of outside-the-box concoctions that have obviously taken time and effort to create. Oozing with the culinary inventiveness that temper’s nose-to-tail cooking became known for, the pineapple jam in the La Piña Pirilla comes from the prickly fruits hanging above the smoldering coals downstairs. The Bone Collector, a buttery warm take on the classic Old Fashioned that slips down like silk, is made with small-batch whiskey left to infuse with smoked bone butter from the kitchen. Out of the Woods, a hypnotic potion of whiskey, sandalwood and jasmine tea, is what I imagine imbibing a deliciously musky cologne must be like.
There are moments when Temper Shoreditch feels like a regurgitation of the businesses’ old concepts that sometimes miss the mark. But, the highlights are a reminder that when temper uses the creative ingenuity that first launched it onto the London restaurant scene to its full potential – it’s still one of the best spots in the city.
The vibe A dark, smokey subterranean meat joint with a theatrical open-fire pit and swanky cocktail bar above.
The food Plates of chunky meats and charred, rich, buttery sides that’ll fill you up fast.
The drink There’s a pleasant, safe wine list, but don’t miss the innovative cocktails.
Time Out tip Bag a stool at the bar to get the full impact of all that fire.