The Camberwell Arms is a "comfortable-as-an-old-shoe gastropub", says Fay Maschler in the London Evening Standard. It has won both the Observer Food Monthly's best Sunday lunch gong and a Time Out Love Food Award - and it more than lives up to the hype.
In fact, says Maschler, it "exemplifies and lays out for our delectation everything positive that has been happening in restaurants recently".
The food here is "hearty and comforting", says John Walsh in The Independent, "but carried off with panache". Highlights include the tender slow-cooked kid served layered with soggy crispbread and a yogurt sauce tasting of mint and chilli, and the mussels with cider, bacon and cockles.
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Yet "despite all the searing and spit-roasting, the best dish was a simple leek and Jerusalem artichoke gratin", says Time Out. "The spiced rhubarb cake with creme fraiche was the happiest marriage, the sweet moments outweighing the sour.
We shouldn't be surprised. Its head chef is Mike Davies, who co-founded the wildly popular Frank's Cafe in Peckham, and its backers also oversee the Anchor & Hope in Southwark and the Canton Arms in Stockwell.
This restaurant is not alone in responding "ebulliently, reasonably and decently to the business of eating and drinking", says Maschler, "but it does seem unusual in its insouciant unified sense of purpose".
The Camberwell Arms is at 65 Camberwell Church Street, London
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