Suckling Pig Feast at St John

Posted: May 24th, 2010 | Author: Bernie B | Filed under: bernie b ate, bernie b eats out | Tags: Beetroot, bernie b, Bone Marrow, Eccles cake, Feasting, Lancashire Chesse, Meringue, Ox Heart, Parsley, Rhubarb, Roast Pig, St John, St John Restaurant, Suckling Feast, Suckling Pig Feast | 3 Comments »

St John is one of my favourite restaurants. It is a Michelin starred restaurant and in the top 50 best restaurants in the world, yet it has none of the stuffiness associated with one. They serve food just as I like, no fancy smancey plating, just dished up simply and looking delicious. You can eat at the bar if you are not too hungry and get a fantastic dish for under a tenner.

Then there is the feasting menu, aimed at groups sharing a few select dishes. Using the excuse of a birthday dinner (not that the dinner was held on the month of any of our birthdays), a few greedy friends and I decided to get a load of us for the Suckling Pig feast. It’s a great way to have a great meal with friends, passing along massive plates of food, almost barbaric, rather that a sit down elegant civilized meal. I had so much fun.

Right, lets get down to the food.

You are allowed to choose a maximum of two starters and two desserts with the Suckling Pig as the main. For the starters we opted for the Grilled Ox Heart, Beetroot & Pickled Walnut and also one of their signature dishes Roast Bone Marrow & Parsley Salad. The Roast Bone Marrow is one of my favourite dishes, I love sitting in the bar on my own and digging into bones, sucking and licking not caring who’s looking but just enjoying. We were aware some of our friends were not offal eaters, but if you come to St John you have to try some out as that’s what they are famous for. Everyone gave it a go. It was good to see everyone tucking into bones. I was wary about whether the Bone Marrow would be a little too fatty as a starter for such a heavy feast, but once the huge plates of bone came that thought flew out of my mind. Poking into a section of bone and digging out bone marrow, spreading onto good toasted Sourdough, bit of Parsley Salad, pinch of the Herb Salt. Delicious.

The Grilled Ox Heart, I know would be enjoyed by the non-offal eaters once they got over the fact that it was heart they were eating. The sliced Ox Heart was like a succulent, juicy steak but with a fuller flavour. This is a great starter. The Ox Heart rich and meaty, but with the Beetroot and Pickled Walnut’s slight sharpness making this a flavoursome yet refreshing starter. I loved it and not amazed when my non-offal eating friend admitted that he really enjoyed it.

For a table of eighteen, each particular starter was served in two huge plates to be passed around, which worked out very well for the greedy like me where I can sneak in seconds. Yes, the portions are very generous and there was enough for everyone.

The arrival of the Suckling Pig was a very raucious moment. The whole pig brought over so momento photos could be taken with the poor dead piglet, before it was carved up. I must say, this little piglet was not a very good looking one.

After pictures were taken, our lovely waitress got to work , decapitating and deboning the piglet, skillfully separating the meat to be served on huge plates. She told us that the pig had been slow roasting in the oven since the morning, simply cooked with a stuffing of  bread, onions and herbs.

They Suckling Pig meat is so juicy. I commented to a friend that the meat this time tasted more grassy and earthy than one I had in the winter. She suggested that this may be because of the diet the piglet had depending on the time of year. The previous Suckling Pig I had at St John tasted more sweet and milky. It was very good none the less, they always get the meat right. Unfortunately because of the way it was roasted the skin was not crispy as we had hope, it was tough and chewy which is a shame, otherwise it would have been perfect. And yes, there was tons of meat left over so I even got a doggy back including the bones which I used to make a delicious soup with (although it was funny trying to fish out some stray stuffing, whoops).

The good thing about ordering the whole pig is that you get to eat the bits that otherwise would not have been served if you went for your ordinary three course meal. So I got to have the smallest trotter I have ever eaten, unfortunately some one got to the cheek before me I love Pig’s Trotters, again it’s the thing like Chicken’s Claws with all the textures and the plus of bone knawing. The piglet trotter was so different to an ordinary pig trotter, meat was less tough, gelatinous and cartilage bits were softer than the full grown version. Nice!

Again we ordered two desserts choices, me insisting on the Rhubarb, Meringue & Cream. I think St John do the best Meringues! Sometimes when I walk pass either Restaurant or Bread & Wine, I will head to the Bakery to see if they have any meringues for takeaway, sometimes I am lucky, most times I go away with a really bad Meringue craving. This dish was amazing!!!!!! It’s the perfect way to end a rich, heavy meal. Light on the outside, but chewy googey on the inside Meringue, the sharpness of the Rhubarb compote and just enough cream to make it special. Just thinking about it is making my mouth water uncontrollably, I wish I could of eaten a whole one on my own. You guessed it, there were no leftovers here.

The other dessert we ordered was the Eccles Cake & Lancashire Cheese, this I will speak less enthusiastically about and was ordered because my other fellow dinner organisers insisted on it. Just because I hate raisins and therefore am not keen on them in the Eccles Cake. But I still had to try it. If you like Eccles Cake, the St John one is the one to eat, the pastry is brilliant. With the Lancashire Cheese, the combination of light flaky pastry of the Eccles Cake (I am not going to mention the filling as I tried to pick off every bit that I could) and the creamy savoury cheese was smoothly melting in the mouth. This dessert was less popular than the Meringue, even though we ordered less portions of it, there was still some left over. I imagine that as we had already had a very rich filling meal, the light tart Rhubarb & Meringue was definitely more preferable to the heavier Eccles Cake & Cheese.

Everyone came out very satisfied and merry, the feast is such a great idea. Service can be slow as you are cut off in your own private room, but most of the time you don’t notice as conversation and drinks are flowing and with the very generous portions you are not left wanting the next course very soon. But I do want more please and so will be finding another excuse for another feast.

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