The Red Sea, 6/10
Telephone: 020 8749 6888
Address: 382 Uxbridge Road, London W12
Open: All week, 9am-11pm (midnight Sat)
In one of the more striking instances of "Be careful what you wish for" since Paul first gazed upon Heather and muttered, "What wouldn't I give to have her stood beside me in a wedding gown?" (a rhetorical question at the time, of course), we finally have a genuine neighbourhood restaurant. After 10 years' incessant moaning about the lack of anywhere decent within easy walking distance - a calculation made, in this case, in feet and preferably inches - it has happened.
A few months ago, the launderette at the end of our street, which never recovered from being hit during a 2004 drive-by shooting, vanished. In its place, by way of a biblical miracle, appeared The Red Sea, a restaurant offering cuisines from the various countries surrounding that richly saline body of water, with the understandable exception of Israel.
During many, many meals in its young life, a strange relationship has developed between us. I am the Aunt Dahlia to The Red Sea's Bertie Wooster, chiding it continually, but only out of love. And, for all the foibles (forgetting to turn on the heating, for example, or serving the wrong dish), I do love it. I just wish it wasn't quite such a silly ass.
To describe this place as unconventional underplays it - it is wilfully eccentric. African restaurants that festoon their walls with Yemeni tourist pictures and naive daubs of rural scenes from Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia seldom select, for the centrepiece of their mural art, a vast framed photograph of a black cab passing a No 12 bus on Westminster Bridge.
If that is a subtle attempt to appeal to non-Africans, the menu swiftly undoes the good work. The left side of the breakfast page reads, "9 - Eggs, £4; 10 - Eggs, £4; 11 - [have a guess, go on] Eggs, £4", thereby marooning those unfamiliar with the Arabic lettering on the right in perplexity.
Perhaps, then, it is small surprise that the only non-Africans I've seen there are myself, my wife and a boy of our acquaintance. Then again, over myriad meals at table 4, underneath the aforementioned vista of Westminster Bridge, I haven't seen many other people of any kind, which is quite ridiculous considering the value on offer.
Apart from the sweetness of the endlessly apologising Eritrean manager, Hege, and his staff, what makes The Red Sea so endearing is its contempt for the notion of profit. How can you not worship a Bring-Your-Own-Bottle restaurant that repeatedly rejects your pleas to be charged £1 for corkage? Or that gives every punter a free bowl of the most wonderful, lamb stock-based vegetable broth - a portion more than generous enough to deter you from ordering a starter?
If the soup is glorious, the rice that accompanies most dishes in insanely gigantic mounds and heavily flavoured with cumin, cardamon and cloves is heavenly. "I'd come for the rice alone," the boy observed during our latest visit, "and this fish is the best I've ever eaten, including that trout I caught myself."
He was right. Samat mekhbaza, an entire flattened sea bass, marinated in various herbs and spices and then char-grilled to a blackened, crispy finish, was superb. Another Yemeni dish called dajaj ala fahim, a chicken quarter baked on hot stone, garnished with red onion and served with salad as well as that rice, is usually excellent by any standards, let alone for £4.50. However, on this one chaotic occasion (they were struggling with a takeaway order for a wedding at the time), the juiciness had been reheated out of it. And my wife's saffron-marinated baby chicken, an Iranian dish that was a triumph of savour and succulence the previous time we ordered it, was so delayed that eventually we took it home and forgot about it.
What we've explored of the Abyssinian menu (spicy lamb and chicken stews and fried beef with fiendish green chillies) has been well seasoned and accurately cooked, and served with soft injerra bread, which, although delicious, has a cold, clammy texture that takes some acquiring. Lebanese starters such as tabbouleh and moutabel are always impeccably fresh.
The problem with The Red Sea - and also much of its charm - is that it is so crazily unpredictable. "The thing is," the boy sagely observed, "how can you review somewhere when you've no idea what it's going to be like next time? It would ruin your reputation."
Ignoring the mirthless female giggle from opposite - how do you tell a 10-year-old that his father has no reputation? - I posited that few restaurants deserve publicity more than an absolute charmer that strives so hard to please and needs only pay some attention to minor detail to become one of London's more celebrated cheapos.
So, on the understanding that the current odds on having a great meal here for thruppence ha'penny are about 65-35, give it a go. And if you happen to be out of luck, feel free to give the slouching, portly, bearded oaf at table 4 a whack as you and The Red Sea prepare to part.
THE BILL
Moutabel £2
Tabbouleh £2
Chicken cooked on stone £4.50
Charcoal-grilled sea bass £8
Saffron-marinated chicken £5
1 Coke £0.80
1 Diet Coke £0.80
Tip £3.90
Total £27
NB Unlicensed, but BYOB: no corkage charge
