Food Review: Levantine Meets Spanish On Broadway Market

Tuyo ★★★★☆

By Lydia Manch Last edited 78 months ago
Food Review: Levantine Meets Spanish On Broadway Market Tuyo 4

'Levantine small plates with a Spanish twist', runs the press release for Tuyo. Technically spot-on, but it doesn't really do justice to the often beautiful, always interesting mash-up of Ottoman and Mediterranean influences they're serving at this new Broadway Market restaurant.

Artichokes, feta and parmesan. Photo by Lydia Manch

Tuyo has seating outside, greenery hanging from every spare square foot of ceiling inside, and a spot on the water. Alright, it's the currently algae-carpeted water of Regent's Canal - but the restaurant still feels like a fix of Mediterranean summer on our visit.

There's cumin in the aioli, saffron in the cocktails and a lot of surprising flourishes in the food menu at large. Salmon's been cured with dill and lime, served in a yoghurt sauce with beetroot, blackberries and blueberries. Not a garnish of blackberries. Big, fruit-feature blackberries. Chicken thigh comes as a small plate of rich, sweet warmth, with honey-poached apricots and sumac yoghurt. And a surprise strong bid for best dish of the night comes from chargrilled artichokes with soya beans, black quinoa, feta cheese and parmesan - uncomplicated things brought together in unexpected harmony.

Tuyo's good at the things you want the second you read the menu — that chicken thigh, that honey — and just as good at the ones you don't think will work — that salmon, those lunatic blackberries. Purists' menu this isn't, bouncing across nations, inspirations and dish sizes with cheerful brightness, but it is purely enjoyable.

Tuyo: making fruit and fish work. Photo by Lydia Manch
Tuyo, 129 Pritchard's Road, E2 9AP.

Last Updated 13 September 2017