So lets set the scene. It was a cold Monday and I had just finished work for the week and I met up with a friend in North London because we were going to a gig later on in the evening. We took a detour and stopped at Euston to down a few pints and what a schoolboy error that was as we were drinking on empty stomachs .
We took the underground to Camden and after walking about a minute or so up the road, Alex and I went down a quiet street occupied by tiny restaurants, from Mexican to Italian. The one that caught our eye was the Bayou Soul, a restaurant that boasts about good old deep south American cooking. We were bloody starving and having deep fried, barbeque, high in cholesterol dishes was what we needed.
The restaurant itself looked okay if somewhat a little tacky. It was quiet, pleasant enough but I suppose it was a Monday night not a Friday. At the back end of the restaurant was a cool little platform with an impressive grand piano and a vintage silver microphone, the type Elvis would sing in to Oh and obviously no stage is set without the pioneer dj decks.
Before I get on with the food, I have to talk about the staff. The waiter who served us, I don't know whether to have felt sorry for the guy or embarrassed for him.
First of all, his uniform made him look as if he was dressed for the circus. Either I had beer goggles on or he was wearing clothes that were two sizes bigger than him. He brought our food out and dropped some of it on the floor, some landing on my jacket and the rest decorating the ground. A couple of minutes later he skidded across the floor as if he was trying to impress us with his dancing on ice moves. He did a Todd Carty and if you don't know what I mean, YouTube it. It was awkward to say the least and I don't know how Alex and I didn't laugh our faces off.
So now onto the food and drink. I will keep this very brief to be honest. Like I mentioned earlier we were starving and reading the menu displayed outside the restaurant enticed us to go in. We had a bunch of starters and made the mistake of ordering a main to share. We wanted to order it because it was fried chicken marinated in buttermilk and that sounded bloody good. We had it with a bunch of sides and unfortunately we wasted our money and the chefs effort and time because our eyes were bigger than our belly's. We hardly scraped the surface with the sides and ate about three quarters of the chicken. I did have a cocktail as it was happy hour and the name "The suffering Bastard" amused me. Actually that name sums up the waiters performance and mine and Alex's experience.
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| Smoked pork, grit cake (similar to polenta) and corn |
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| The Suffering Bastard cocktail |
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| Barbeque Chicken |
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| Smoked shredded beef and gravy in pastry with garlic aioli |
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| Creole style calamari, spring onions, chillies and lime chipotle |
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| Bayou's Hot and Creole sauces |
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| Buttermilk fried chicken with gravy, onion rings and cornbread |
To sum up the food, it was average at best, most of it, if not all of it wasn't seasoned. Looking back, we went to town on it because we were like I keep saying starving and drank quite a fair amount of alcohol at which probably made the food taste better than it was.
I will however like to say that I was impressed by their hot sauces, all of which was homemade and they were excellent.
I wouldn't say that I wouldn't eat at the Bayou Soul again, I just wouldn't go out of my way to go there. I would maybe consider going there if they improved because it does have the potential to be a lot better and I hope they do because I don't like being negative.
Its up to you guys to decide whether to give it a go. If so let me know what you think. Peace out FoodPunkers.
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