Funky Asia, E1 - review

The heart lifts. The shops and restaurants here are improving every week, the dealers selling more serious furniture, better clothes, the food offering getting ever more varied and accomplished too.

On Tuesday evening I was surprised to walk by Adnams Cellar & Kitchen (75 Brushfield Street), the first branch of the splendid Suffolk wine merchant in central London. I asked how long it had been open and was told "since two o'clock", and was offered a taste of one of its longstanding specialities, the fabulous Macon Villages Domaine de la Bongran, made by Jean Thevenet from overripe grapes, butterscotchy nectar, worth every penny of £17.50 a bottle. I last drank this wine with Dover sole, bought off the boat on Aldeburgh beach and pan-fried, many years ago; the first sip instantly brought the day back, like that old madeleine but a lot tastier.

And that was the gastronomic highlight of the evening. Marching past the temptations of St John Bread & Wine (94-96 Commercial Street), the Luxe (109 Commercial Street) and finally Hawksmoor (157 Commercial Street), I headed for Funky Asia, which opened a few weeks ago on the edge of this golden spot.

Formerly Lahori Masala, Funky Asia has been recalibrated by its Bengali owners as a modern pan-Asian restaurant, with the kitchen apparently being overseen by Danh Huu, who has worked at those magic joints Nobu and Roka, although surely in a pretty modest capacity.

The decor is a bit scuzzy - mis-matched tables and chairs, a grim plywood wall, coloured lights, random clocks everywhere - the owners having misunderstood the shabby chic gastropub thing, opting to mix it with a bit of the industrial All Saints look. The staff, in strange taupe Nehru suits aiming to look a little like the swishy staff in the West End pan-Asian palaces, were attentive yet somehow unsettlingly insincere, even vaguely derisive. Yet it was the loud music tape, on an incredibly short loop - 30 minutes max? - coming round again and again to George Michael's awful Jesus to a Child, that pained the most.

Everything tasted inappropriately sweet - a Soho Julep was all syrup and even the house white, an Opal Ridge Semillon Chardonnay (£16.95)
had been selected to be a long way off-dry.

The cooking was a joke, though not a funny one.

Thin, metallic miso soup clearly came from a packet whereas tom yum soup was disastrously home-made, both hot and sweet, none of the ingredients getting on.

Vegetable tempura, served in a poppadom basket, was hopeless, the vegetables raw inside yet burned on the outside, almost no batter still stuck on - it would have been a lousy result for somebody trying to cook this dish for the very first time.

Salmon maki California-style, with big bits of avocado sticking out, were not too bad, save for an unexpected crunchiness, which on inspection turned out to be bits of deep-fried onion ring, an unusual addition, almost witty. Tuna sashimi was overpriced at £7.95 for just three slices of a cheap, almost tasteless cut, albeit served on a big bowl of ice to give the grand look favoured by the likes of Gilgamesh.

We didn't give up. Lamb chops in Korean spices (£12.50) were fatty and fiercely spiced, served with a jammy chilli sauce; pan-fried seabass with tomato salsa Vietnamese style (£10) was a decent fillet of fish, not badly cooked, then covered with more jammy gloop. Even plain jasmine rice had a grimly dry texture. That's when we gave up.

Enjoyable pan-Asian, partly Asian, more or less Vietnamese or sort of Japanese food is being keenly chomped all over London now, all of it I suspect backed up and supported by the ubiquity, familiarity and relative dependability of Wagamama. There's a bustling branch of Cay Tre in Soho now, while places like Viet Grill on Kingsland Road have got the idea that service and atmosphere help too. Do try Fujiyama Noodle Bar in Brixton for great value - it shows what a chain like Wagamama can't quite do.

It's easy to see why the owners of Funky Asia thought hitting this trend might be a smart move, but they've got the whole thing wrong, beginning or ending with the name. Nevertheless, the London restaurant scene is so interesting to observe, the way places open and close, the way styles are adopted and dropped, how areas are progressively colonised - and in its own parodic way Funky Asia reveals quite how pan-Asian has slumped right through the market, after being such a Waggy thing.

As Thomas Hardy so thoughtfully told us, "if a way to the Better there be, it exacts a full look at the Worst". That would be Funky Asia.

Funky Asia
159 Commercial Street, E1