CARNE

It’s been a while since I wrote about food here on the Latest website, but I’m back and as hungry for good food as ever. Not sure why I have been neglecting my love of dining out, perhaps a few rather disappointing meals out and certainly some truly grim ones. So what brings me back out, one word, Carne!

When Carne first opened in Hove I was blown away by the confidence of a team launching a restaurant dedicated to cooking fine cuts of meat. In a world where the buzz seems to be all about “plant based” food, a fashionable way of saying vegan or vegetarian it seems to me, to have a place dedicated to quality meats seemed a fine idea. I have no issue with either and over the years I have enjoyed some of the best food Brighton has to offer in innovative places like Terre a Terre, but I am at the end of the day an omnivore, and one raised in a family of butchers. I like meat and I like good meat. I certainly go along with the idea of eating better quality less often, free range and organic go to the top of my list, and I love it when a menu lists the provenance of their ingredients.

Carne was very good at just that and when it closed, seemingly prematurely, it was very sad news. But now it’s back and that news has driven me back to the keyboard to report.

It had been a long afternoon of excellent but very dark theatre. Outside the rain was pouring down and the wind whipping it along Western Road. Squally does not even touch the sides, but it did mark a turning in the seasons that prompted a desire for a solid meat based Sunday meal. Now I have long been dismissive of pub roasts. How so many can claim to be “The Best” beggars me, and far too many are far from living up to that claim. I for one, and I am not alone in this, despair at the mountainous mounds of meat and far too many veg, piled onto plates, or even worse into wide soup plates and then drowned in dismal gravy. Soup plates indeed! Ever tried cutting not tender meat when it is sliding around in a swamp of indescribable slurry? Well you end up with your elbows round your ears! And the price… well enough of the ranting, I think many of you will know exactly what I am talking about.

So Carne returns, with an emphasis on fine cuts and well executed cooking. I was joined by the ubiquitous Mr L, my long standing dining companion now for some thirty odd years. We braved the weather and arrived in Church Road Hove with hearty appetites, and thank goodness for that. I had rather forgotten that Carne was the home of a hearty repast.

The menu is delightfully short, a good sign in my book, and on a Sunday they offer a selection of steaks and roasts. There is even a sharing roast platter which whilst very tempting sounded rather large, and I was already reading the starters and being very heavily drawn to two in particular. So we both decided on a starter and a roast.

Mr L chose the steak tartare, a dish I had enjoyed back when they first opened, and he declared it perfect. I was torn, burrata, fennel and orange or lamb chop. I should have gone burrata but the idea of a lamb chop, tender eye of meat wrapped in perfect crystalline fat was just too attractive and all in a delicately spiced masala sauce… I made the right decision, two generous cutlets, tender as could be and that fat rendered to perfection. It did just what I had hoped for, even if it did dent my appetite for what was to come.

Mr L moved on to the roast chicken. I gasped when I saw the plate that arrived, so much meat, roast potatoes and a chicken sausage roll too. It was gargantuan. I chose belly pork, I eat a lot of chicken at home so when out I tend not to chose it. My plate arrived and was equally impressive, a huge slab of tender pork that you could have cut with a spoon and a black pudding bon-bon.

So let’s get down to the details. Mr L loved the chicken but felt that he did not need the sausage roll, and in fact there was so much meat that he asked at the end for a doggy back. I hasten to add that Mr L does not have a doggy.

I loved my pork, the crackling was perfect but in one large piece that was difficult to navigate. The black pudding bon-bon tasted great but was a little too hard to cut and again perhaps not needed. We both loved the roast potatoes, fluffy inside and crisp outside and the separate serving of veg was excellent and again generous, roast carrots, tender steam broccoli and hispi cabbage all delicious.

Then on to the promise of “real” gravy. Now I like good gravy but I want it in a vessel on the side to be applied at my discretion. I like it on my vegetables and not on the meat. This gravy arrived in two small pans and was gravy, not a sauce, not a jus, that watery nonsense that drips down your front on its way to the mouth. No this was real gravy, not too thick, not too thin, plenty of it and packed with flavour.

I have a bit of thing bout Yorkshire puddings only being served with beef, but that said I have never sent one back and these were good!

This a trencherman fare, not for the faint hearted for sure and we lapped it up. If I had my way I would have replace the bon-bon with some apple sauce maybe and perhaps the sausage roll would be better delivered as a traditional sage and onion stuffing, but minor quibbles. I failed to finish the whole plate but simply because I was sated.

That said and in the interest of being thorough in my task, we did delve into the puddings. Sadly my toffee, banana and pecan choice had sold out, it seemed the lightest option after all that meat and I know you will laugh at that. So in the end we both chose the cheesecake with port. Now say it myself I do make a fine baked cheesecake, not often and usually for friends. This one was up there, rich and creamy  properly baked and drizzled with a well made port reduction. It was simply delicious and a fine end to a fine meal. Mr L drank the house red, by the glass, I had tap water and the service was excellent and friendly.

Prices? well not terrifying for such quality and generosity, you can pay a whole lot more for a whole lot less, and the room is beautiful and spacious, not crammed in so rather elegant.

I will return, those lamb chops are calling!

Carne

63 Church Road, Hove BN3 2BD

01273 685278
info@carne-hove.co.uk

OPENING HOURS

Sunday – Thursday
12pm – 11pm
Last food orders 9pm
Friday – Saturday
12pm – Midnight
Last food orders 10pm