Bright

Modern European

1 Westgate St, London E8 3RL

£££

Bright is a neighbourhood restaurant, wine shop and wine bar in London Fields. London Fields is awash with well known restaurants and bars – from the rooftop of Netil 360 to the lively night-time spot Mare Street Market. The streets that surround Bright have energy, life, and an effortless version of cool. However, are these ‘trendy’ neighbourhood bistros all they are cracked up to be? Or can you get a better (and much more reasonably priced) meal elsewhere?

I first heard of Bright after seeing it on a chef I like’s Instagram story. They had been to Bright for an anniversary meal and raved about the dishes they ate there. After a long wait for weekend availability, I managed to get a Friday night table at 20:15 in late April. Given the menu is more on the pricey side, and the restaurant itself has a lot of chat surrounding it, we booked ahead hoping there was something to celebrate by the time it came around to make it feel a little more justified. Low and behold, life often hits you with rare moments of fate, and at the end of March I got a new job the same week that Tom got promoted, giving us plenty to splash out on.

After a couple of overpriced glasses of wine in plastic cups at Netil 360 (this place really is overrated), we wandered out as Bright it just next door. After peering into a restaurant window with no name and looking slightly confused, a waitress came out to save us, informing us we were indeed in the right place. I am still confused as to exactly why it didn’t have a name on the outside, and whilst it’s obvious that it’s doing no harm to business as the restaurant was packed when we got there, it can’t help but feel a little bit snobbish and exclusive. The chap on front of house was nice enough, but gave me slightly odd vibes. When we asked for our table he disappeared, only to return brandishing a rock’n’roll hand sign whilst leaning to one side… I took that to mean our table was ready so followed him to be seated.

We had a good table– far right corner at the back of the restaurant, meaning I (who was facing outwards) got a full view. It’s a cute setting: it feels casual and cosy, lit mostly by candlelight and the glow of the open kitchen. The toilets are a bit of a faff as there’s only two and if they’re engaged you have to stand a little awkwardly in the way of the waiting staff getting things from the store room and kitchen, but overall the space is perfectly pleasant. The wine list has many options, going by our normal rule the second cheapest bottle of red (£38) was a Merlot from Bordeaux – jackpot! We ordered with a waitress who was nice enough but took a little too long to crack a smile (I think my smile was so enthusiastic it verged on the creepy side and forced her to overcome the desire to be cool and squeeze out a small smirk). She advised us that the usual amount to order is between 4-6 dishes, and that she would let us know if she thought we were getting too much or too little.

There’s never any risk of me or many of the people I dine with ever underordering, however I have on more than one occasion definitely overordered, so it was reassuring to some degree to have been given this guidance. From the menu, we went for two starters: the gnocco fritto with pancetta (£7) and the grilled green asparagus with brown butter hollandaise (£18). After a pretty long wait of 50 minutes I was delighted when the gnocco fritto arrived. It consisted of four pieces of light, expertly constructed pastry which was warm, flaky and rich. It was a special experience – unlike any pastry I’ve had before. Complete with a topping of salty, thinly-sliced pancetta which whilst flavoursome, did by no means overpower the rest of the dish. After another pretty long wait the asparagus arrived: a snap decision based on the logic that if it was this expensive, it must be something really special. The reality was that we had been duped - the asparagus was nice, decent; cooked well with just the right amount of softness to bite ratio. The hollandaise was admittedly some of the best I’ve had, but it was still £18 for what essentially felt like a side portion of veg. I think that this dish purely served the purpose of enabling the vegetarians out there to feel as though they too were experiencing something special, but this wasn’t anything compelling for me.

For the mid-course we ordered a fregola with cuttlefish ragu (£17) and a duck agnolotti with roasting juices (£18). I was intrigued at the concept of a ragu made from fish as it’s a word I so often associate with slow cooked meats. I was pretty shocked on its arrival to see a shockingly ugly bowl of what looked like black soup. Sure, I get that cuttlefish excrete an ink when they die just like their squidly cousins. I also happen to be a massive fan of this death juice, but am more used to seeing it in an aesthetically pleasing setting, such as laced within strands of fresh tagliatelle, or embellished into an arroz negro like hundreds of tiny black gemstones. This was honestly nothing more than a concoction reminiscent of something you might find in the playground of a nursery when the kids have been let loose into the soil and told to ‘experiment’. Whilst I’m aware that fregola takes on a more cous cous like format, I always thought this was more akin to a giant cous cous: something with substance and a bit of bite. This was as though there had been a few small cous cous grains left sitting in the black soup, absorbing some flavour but providing no real grounding for the dish. The more I think about it the more disgusting the whole thing seems. A massive let down from ingredients which can so easily be so good.

The duck agnolotti, on the other hand, was sublime: a total juxtaposition to the cuttlefish ragu. These tiny parcels of pasta were expertly crafted, the dish looked delicate yet indulgent, the pasta was perfectly al dente for me and was packed generously with tender and flavourful duck meat. The pretty parcels were floating in a dark, rich sauce which screamed of meat and smoke. This was some of the nicest pasta I have had for a while, reminiscent of the pigeon ravioli I had back at Manteca which made me fall in love. Whilst it didn’t really make up for the mud soup that had come before, it did help to take our minds off it.

For the final section we went for the steamed ray wing, mussels and creamed potatoes (£28), and the grilled flat iron, romaine lettuce, anchovy and parmesan (£35). The ray wing was truly lovely: tender fish that fell away from the fork, placed on a bed of creamy, smooth mash that felt really naughty with each bite. There were only a couple of mussels placed on top but the flavour of these came through, along with the tart capers and onion that were swimming in the citrusy sauce. I keep being surprised at how good fish dishes are in restaurants and having not had ray wing for a while I had forgotten at just how effortlessly delicate and delicious this fish really is. My mum used to make it at home, and I’d always love scooping the flesh away from the bone so easily, turning it over when I was done to have a whole other layer of fish on the other side! Bright went one step further and had impeccably de-boned the wing, making the experience even more enjoyable.

There seemed to be a pattern forming with our experience of Bright, with a real hit and miss to each stage of dishes. This was somewhat similar, in that the flat iron steak, though cooked nicely, was nothing on those served at ‘Flat Iron’ for a fraction of the price. It was perfectly pink, but lacked that charcoal smoky flavour I like to taste when having steak out. Furthermore, this is a pretty cheap cut of beef, and once again the price tag just didn’t seem to match up to the quality. It came with some lettuce coated with a nice salty, slightly tangy sauce similar to that found on a Caesar salad. The leaves were covered in parmesan, and though they were a nice addition to the meat they didn’t really set the Thames on fire with excitement.

As our meal came to a close a waitress that we hadn’t had yet came over to congratulate us… “ah sick, sick, you guys have done so well.” We were a little confused, asking if we had ordered more than their average customer. “No, no, but you guys you know, you just really went for it.” This was also said with a laid back ‘coooooool dude’ approach similar to the part time punk rocker that greeted us on arrival. I still don’t really know what she meant, but judging from the £177 bill that we swiftly ordered following the encounter, I imagine they were just very proud at how much we had forked out for the occasion. I’ve never been congratulated on spending a silly amount of money, in fact mum tells me that I need to get better at reigning it in, so this was a first.

Bright really is a 50/50 for me, which is why I simply can’t give it any more than three stars. The service isn’t rude but is a little odd, a little too ‘cool’ maybe – a feeling synonymous with the fact the restaurant has no label and charges £18 for asparagus. Each set of dishes had a clear winner, all of which were genuinely really tasty, but the other half of the dishes were either bafflingly underwhelming for the price or actually kind of gross. I worry that Bright is just another one of those London restaurants making you feel ‘lucky’ to be there, and much like drinking good wine out of a plastic cup at the rooftop bar next door, you actually don’t feel too lucky at all. Whilst bright does have some moments of stardom, my parting thoughts of it are overall a little dim.

OVERALL RATING: ***

https://www.brightrestaurant.co.uk/