Perfectly timed to cash in on the current trend for Middle Eastern cooking, says Jay Rayner in The Guardian, The Good Egg "plays fast and loose with various Jewish culinary traditions from America's Atlantic East Coast to the eastern end of the Mediterranean".
A "restless, elbows-down" joint, "this egg is not so much good as a curate's", he adds, with some dishes that "linger in the memory" and others you will try to forget.
The all-day menu offers up some "tantalising" fare. Dak Dak salad with pine nuts and pomegranate is a highlight, as are Za'tar buttermilk fried chicken with chilli honey and the Iraqi fried aubergine pita with house pickles, seasoned zhoug and a mild mango amba.
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But "too many of the dishes are in need of a more boisterous approach", says Grace Dent in the London Evening Standard.
"The menu reads like a bawdy love letter that hopes to get my knickers off." – Dent
On the plus side, says The Independent, the place represents "stonking great value" and not just for London.
"Compact but not packed, stylish but not slavishly so", there's plenty here to make up for a few shortcomings, says Time Out, and on the whole the food is "very good".
"In a city where too often a new restaurant opening leaves us scratching our heads wondering 'What were they thinking?', Good Egg seems to have cracked it."
The Good Egg is at 93 Stoke Newington Church Street, London
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