10 Cases, 16 Endell Street, London WC2 (020 7836 6801). Meal for two, including wine and service, £90
The 10 Cases is the restaurant equivalent of one of those people you know you should fancy, but can't – not quite. At the end of the date you say: "The problem's not you, it's me," because you don't want to hurt their feelings when, of course, the problem is them: they have a really irritating laugh, or protruding nasal hair, or they don't know the name of the prime minister. And yet they are fabulous in every other way. The 10 Cases really is fabulous in every other way. It describes itself as a "bistro à vin" – its name standing testament to its policy of listing only 10 whites and 10 reds (plus a couple of champagnes and a rosé) and buying only 10 cases of each wine. When it's gone, it's gone. They move on and buy something else.
Every bottle is available by the glass, the 50cl carafe and the bottle, and the prices are very reasonable. From the whites we tried a lovely, restrained Riesling from Germany's Nahe valley and a crisp Chablis. From the reds a classic bit of dense, big-fisted Bordeaux for £8.60 a glass from the house (though not the vineyards) of Haut Brion, and a Manium Mencia from northwest Spain. If you have ever wanted to experiment with wines, to range far and wide during a meal, 10 Cases is the place to do it.
The eccentrically handwritten wine list suits the look of the place. In all respects it feels like a neighbourhood restaurant. It's all white walls and wooden furniture, a bar and blackboards listing that day's dishes. The nibbles – a bowl of radishes for £3, anchovies at the same price, roasted garlic, grilled octopus, sweet oily slices of saucisson or a thimble of brown potted crab which had about it the smooth, retro aspect of Shippam's paste (for the nostalgics) – are unchanging. And there's a handful of dishes that are on every day: a duck-egg and bacon salad, a whole lemon sole, a beef fillet and so on.
The rest of the menu changes every day and lists just three choices at each course. That's the problem. Offering so little choice is great; Lord save us from menus that make you feel like you've read War and Peace before you've started eating. But with so little choice, everything has to be bang on. Not everything was. And to retread the old Jewish joke: the portions! So small!
Admittedly they don't charge much for this corner of town – £4 to £5 for a starter, low teens for mains – which is probably why they don't give you very much. Best of the savoury dishes was a dolls' house-sized bowl of pea and ham soup with chewy shreds of ham in it. For all its depth of flavour, though, the soup lacked texture. It was just a little too well mannered. By comparison another starter of braised lentils with merguez sausage was decidedly ill-mannered. Just half a sausage loitered near a pile of lentils, which covered an unadvertised lump of ham hock.
But the mains were the real problem. A veal breast cassoulet sounded interesting, and it was, but not in a good way: a vast, square hunk of undercooked meat, looking like something carved by Barbara Hepworth, sat in a meagre puddle of white beans. A braised rabbit leg was a little better, but the saucing was dull and the patty of veg-covered mash a whole puck of so-what. (I asked about their approach to vegetarians. "Oh, we'd find something for them, even if it was just a mushroom omelette." Oh dear.) Dessert rescued things with a chestnut crème caramel and a finely executed almond and pear tart.
So that's barely half the dishes we tried doing the business. And of course on another day, when they were cooking things they understood better, the meal could have been terrific, but in the expensive business of lunch, namely mine, consistency is all. 10 Cases is a brilliant idea for a restaurant; it just needs better food.
Email Jay at jay.rayner@observer.co.uk or visit theguardian.com/profile/jayrayner for all his reviews in one place
