Cue Point At Home. Deliveries nationwide (cue-point.co.uk). Main dishes from £14 to £55, sides and jars of condiments £4-£6, dessert £14
A Saturday lunchtime and my kitchen smells distinctly of wood smoke, of the autumnal crackle of smouldering log. It’s comforting. It suggests something intensely encouraging is going on in here. It’s also odd because the only thing actually going on in here right now is the heating of vac-packed bags of food in a large pan of water. Those bags are part of a delivery from Cue Point, which describes itself as a “British Afghan smoked BBQ company”. Clearly no amount of pressure-sealing will stop some of the tang of burning tree from clinging to the product. Blimey. Imagine the smell of the clothes worn by the people who made this food. I salute both their forbearance and their washing machines.
There are many things we want from brilliant cooks. One of them is that they do for us that which we could not realistically do for ourselves. Serious low and slow barbecue of the sort Cue Point specialises in requires many hours of nerdy attention to detail: to the rubs, to the maintenance of temperature, to the interaction of smoke and heat on ingredients. Are you up for all that? No, me neither. The arrival of this into my kitchen feels emblematic of the year we have lived through. Before 2020 I would not have dreamed of ordering boxes of Afghan-influenced barbecue. Now it seems a logical response to the situation in which we find ourselves.
The one issue with BBQ is that it comes with more baggage than the Kardashians trying to get away to a private island for a mini-break. I adored the food at that grill temple Smokestak, even while acknowledging the arch pose of the faux pollution-clouded windows. The recipes too often seem to involve spice rubs, smoke and a bucket full of high-grade testosterone. There’s also the whole pig thing. Obviously, I’m very much with the pig project. Don’t ask me to recant. Even so I recognise it renders the menu less than inclusive.
Step forward then Cue Point, run by Mursal Saiq. She was born in Kabul and came to the UK with her family as an asylum seeker. She’s not your classic London BBQ operator. Too many hip restaurants, Saiq has said, benefit from what she calls “culture porn and exclusivity”. The marketing trades on a certain exotica. It may sell well, but it’s no longer relevant to the very people who first brought it here.
She wanted to do something different. Cue Point, which is both halal and vegan-friendly, is the result. Her business partner is chef Josh Moroney, who is of British-Guyanese heritage. He learned his craft at Smokestak and Brad McDonald’s restaurant, Shotgun. Together they apply both their knowledge and mixed heritage to a menu that acknowledges American BBQ traditions (minus the pig), but brings in a bunch of others, including the Afghan, both through spicing and entirely vegan dishes of stewed and smoked vegetables.
It all comes with what they call “nacos”: palm-sized breads in which to wrap everything. They are a cross between naans and tacos; between their Asian and South American backgrounds. Then there are the many toppings, from a green, brassic and salty Afghan chutney, through to a jalapeño jam. There are toasted pumpkin seeds, pickled red chillies, pickled red onions, a barbecue sauce, sour cream and a bunch of other things besides.
I rampage through the delivery menu and end up with a tightly stacked fridge. I decide to empty it across two meals. Cooking mostly involves putting those vac-packed bags in simmering water for between 10 and 25 minutes. For lunch we have the “vegan nacos kit” at £30, which easily serves three of us. There’s a generous pile of the breads, which also arrive vac-packed and revive quickly under the grill. To pile into them there’s a chunky serving of root veg that have clearly spent a long stretch over indirect heat. They have their own sweet caramelised vegetal funk, but also a bold hit of that smoke. Alongside, there’s a smoked ratatouille, which is a lightly spiced version of the French classic after it’s been taken out to explore a bit of the world. Add toppings. Put the kitchen roll on the table. You may need it.
That evening we move on to the hefty beef ribs naco kit at £55, plus the heavily sauced lamb ribs. The beef has been removed from the bones, though, endearingly, they have sent those, too, as if showing their workings in the margin. I feared the vac-packing would turn the meats to mush. Instead, it’s as if the beef has just left the grill. It has a wonderous black crust and a soothing fibrous texture. It has yielded to the long attentions of the smoke, like Barbara Cartland lazing back on her chaise longue, if she’d ever been rendered on a barbecue. Most of the fat has gone, leaving just the lightest lubrication. It is anything but dry. The lamb ribs are a little chewier, but they too are sweet and lean.
From the vegan side there is borani kadoo, which they describe as a classic Afghan dish, given their own interpretation. Pumpkin has been long-smoked, then braised in a spiced, tomato-based sauce. It is all kinds of spoonable joy. We have their sturdy potato salad and their sweet potato mash, which doesn’t quite convince me that it’s the best thing to do with a sweet potato.
There is also dessert, of a dangerous kind. It’s a wrist-thick, foot-long sausage of raw chocolate chip cookie dough. I am meant to slice it into rounds and bake it, but I start eating it raw, because that’s what you do during a pandemic when no one is watching. Eventually, I attempt to rejoin civilisation by combining it with ice-cream, Ben & Jerry’s style. It is less shameful. Finally, I bake the damn cookies. God, they’re good. I find myself powerless in the face of their crunchy, chewy chocolate loveliness. These are all important technical terms.
Cue Point HQ has moved about, but they now have a site from which they can serve diners, Covid-19 restrictions allowing. However, their online business, sending out this vibrant, dynamic food nationwide in recyclable packaging, is what we need right now. Generally, I roll my eyes when people bang on about food being thy medicine. If I’m ill, I want pharmaceuticals. But a Cue Point delivery did make me feel a lot better.
News bites
Liverpool’s very popular, three-strong Maray restaurant group, which has just reopened as the city moved into tier 2, has also launched the Maray at Home kit, available nationwide. It costs £45, serves two people and very much reflects its Mediterranean-influenced approach. The first kit includes, among other things, whipped goat’s cheese with pickled grapes, hummus and flatbreads, tabbouleh, fattoush and their falafel sharer kit (home.maray.co.uk).
Edinburgh charcuterie company East Coast Cured has added a bunch of hampers to their online shop. The £50 Savoury Sharing Hamper includes a selection of their own cured meats and salamis alongside marinated olives, cheese sables and oatcakes. The Sweet and Savoury Hamper at £55 adds in chocolates and shortbread (eastcoastcured.com).
Extraordinary news: a Michelin-starred restaurant not doing a meal kit. Instead Sat Bains, of his eponymous two-starred restaurant in Nottingham, has launched a new project called Mommabains. Pulling on his Punjabi heritage, Bains has devised a menu featuring vegan samosas and curries based on his mother’s recipes. Initially they’ll be available at a limited number of UK chippies including No 1 Cromer in Norfolk and the Cod’s Scallops in the East Midlands. Bains plans to make the curries available for delivery nationwide.
Email Jay at jay.rayner@observer.co.uk or follow him on Twitter @jayrayner1
