It's that time of year when you take stock. (Sips. Adjusts seasoning).
That done, it's natural to recall the films, books and whatever* which have left their mark this year. And when you're firmly in the gourmand camp, the meals which have lingered will be high on the list.
Which brings me smartly to Pitt Cue.
With reviews that tend to read more like odes by the love struck, it's safe to say Pitt Cue had some expectations to live up to. And they're entirely justified. This will be an unabashed, unapologetic love letter to Tom Adams and Jamie Berger; to Pitt Cue and to their hulking grill.
A recent piece in The Guardian said 'this isn't a BBQ restaurant- it's a restaurant which barbecues'. And looking around at this elegant space in the shadow of The Gherkin, it's hard to believe that Pitt Cue was doing ribs and pulled pork on enamelled trays not so long ago. As the cachet of the latter goes into decline, no doubt due to the ubiquity of shoddy versions (who was it who recently described it as going from Davids Bowie to Brent?), Pitt Cue has grown to offer far a more evolved menu in the shadow of The Gherkin.
Whatever Pitt Cue may be, I love it. The food keeps coming back to me in vivid flashes. They love animal fat, here- they love its texture, its taste, its lubricating and transformative qualities.
At heart, their ethos is simple: find great produce and treat it with time and care. The classic 'low and slow', with food finished on the wood-burning behemoth of a bespoke grill from Michigan which dwarfs anything I've seen before: it's teeming with gears and handles and wheels for minute adjustments. These are no mere gewgaws, though: to watch it in operation is to see a series of tiny adjustments, of precision at play. It's an undeniably impressive statement.
A starter of Mangalitsa charcuterie is teamed with walnuts: you get three cuts and they all hum with porkiness and that lustrous fattiness.
There's a pretty prodigious beer list here: they come from far and wide, from session-strength pale ales from from all corners, to handle-with-care 11% porters. They are all available to take out, at a 30% discount, too, which is civilised of them.
A honking great dollop of a pungent kimchi is a fiery introduction. Brisket on toast is faultless, the saltiness of the meat cut through with tart pickles and the juices soaking into the sourdough. A great start, one to get the engines revving.
The bacon comes from their own pigs that they breed in Cornwall. Not just any pigs, either- the Mangalitsa 'sheep pig' breed is famed for the high percentage of body fat hiding under its woolly coat, fat that brokers flavour. You ready your cutlery to spear, to slice, and you find the fork easing through the whole thickness of the chop with an unnatural ease. You wonder: have I been fooled? Is this a piece of confectionery, some jape? It's a stellar piece of meat: grill work turned right up to 11.
Tackle any of the larger cuts etched on the blackboard, and you are equipped with the sort of knife which immediately puts you in mind of fighting for your life against a grizzly bear, stripped to the waist. Me, that is- not the bear. A bear stripped to the waist would be ridiculous.
Pork jowl is cured, pressed, then placed in the smoker for 7 hours and finished on the grill. And it's a revelation. What a dish it is: your knife encounters the briefest of resistances, the merest hint of a crust; and then it's all about that hot, buttery fat and yielding meat. It's an incomparable texture, a vivid, carnal reminder of why you could never be a vegetarian. It's glorious, the kind of dish you remember for months and years to come: it's supremely confident work to present it in its simplicity, and easily the best thing I ate all year.
An onglet is faultless, the béarnaise rich yet spiky with aniseed: the famed bone marrow mashed potato every bit as wickedly indulgent as you'd hoped.
There are desserts, of course: there are things with chocolate and salted caramel and ice cream. But here's it's really all about the meat.
Pitt Cue deserves every plaudit coming its way. I'm already planning a return trip. I was doing that very soon into our meal, in all honesty: it's the kind of place which makes you feel sickeningly smug that you are there, eating that food, in that moment- rather than anywhere else.
In his rather damns-with-faint-praise review of Hang Fire Smokehouse, the usually-reliable Tony Naylor cited Pitt Cue as the touchstone. That's a little unfair, because they are hardly like-for-like in catchment or style; from smokehouse beginnings, Pitt Cue has evolved hugely and is now operating at a level of its own invention. The results are sublime.
Or as a drunken late-night text to Sophie Ball (also having an Eat London Weekend) put it: 'IT'S LIKE ANGELS JUST HAD SEX IN MY MOUTH'.
Pitt Cue
1 Devonshire Square
London
EC2M 4YP
*For me that'd include You want It Darker and Skeleton Tree, along with The Exorcist serialisation and The Master and Margarita.