The Underground Bistro,
182A Lisburn Road,
Belfast,
BT9 6AL
028 9013 4769
FIRST up, a plea to all you lovely restaurants out there. Please, once you’ve put together your well-thought-out dishes, cooked and composed just so, plated on some handsome stoneware and ready to delight whoever it lands in front of, please don’t throw in some coriander without telling anybody. Please.
By all means, if you think it’ll make the dish better, then add it to your heart’s content but when it comes to somewhere it’s neither needed nor expected fair warning is always necessary.
Obviously, Mexican, South and South East Asian places, where coriander would be no surprise in much of the repertoire, get a pass. Eyes are wide open going somewhere like that. As they should be if a dish in an otherwise non-coriander-heavy environment obviously leans that way. But elsewhere the divisive herb really needs flagged up.
The generic anomaly that makes it taste like soap to a not-insignificant slice of the population means it’s an unannounced guest that can wreak havoc, even in the smallest quantities.
So the coriander cress that has found its way into the watermelon and feta salad at The Underground Bistro in south Belfast could easily ruin the experience for anyone in possession of OR6A2 olfactory receptor genes. Which is a shame, because it’s a very good salad.
It’s part of a varied and surprising – in a good way – brunch menu to be found at the bottom of steps descending from the city’s Lisburn Road.
Below street level is all the dark wood and tastefully exposed brick you’d expect of a modern bistro, though the framed art takes things in a quirkier direction, with ‘up the Lagan in a bubble’ scrawled on a river scene on one wall, a print of a dapper fox on another.
Surrounding the coriander cress sneaking around under the alias of ‘baby leaves’ was a zippy salad, the classic sweet and salty combination of watermelon and feta filled out with fresh bursts and crunches of tomato and cucumber.
It’s all speckled with a mojito dressing, the lime and mint helping provide a wake-up call sort of brunch rather than one to sop up overindulgence that may have forced breakfast into the afternoon.
Something closer to that sort of brunch comes in a cracker of a chicken dish. A beautifully cooked piece of bird comes in a resonantly crunchy coating, with interest added by oatmeal to give a toothsome bite.
It sits on a bed of skin-on champ, similarly knobbly, crushed rather than mashed and singing of spud. There’s more fantastic roughness in the perfectly-made jalapeño and cheese cornbread.
A light gravy with a hint of heat goes on top of everything – as does more coriander cress but that’s easily disposed of. Still, no need.
There’s also really no need to order poached egg to go with the chicken but we’re here for brunch and what better way to brunch something up than breaking a soft egg over the top of it?
It’s initially forgotten but quickly appears in a little bowl. In truth, it could have been bounced from kitchen to table. A poached egg with a hard yolk is wasting everyone’s time. Especially given the wheels of any good brunch are greased by the glory of runny yolks. It’s a surprise because Underground gets so much else right.
There’s no consistency problems with the sweet stuff as the two desserts on the menu are lovely creamy things. The ‘Loose About The Hoose’ – they like their bantzy dish titles – brings white chocolate in the form of little pebbles and scoops of mousse, with a healthy ribbon of slightly sharp cherry and hibiscus syrup to rein things in from sugar overload.
Better was the mango kulfi with pieces of the fruit, a fragrant saffron syrup and flakes of coconut. Every bit as refreshing as that salad, with no coriander lurking anywhere. No warning necessary, except to leave room for it.
THE BILL
Watermelonnnn £9
Southern Bird £15
Egg £1.50
Who Like D’Mango £7.50
Loose About The Hoose £7.50
Watermelon Mojito £9
Total £54
