‘It tasted like someone had stubbed their fag out in my Mr Whippy': William Sitwell reviews Kokin, London

Telegraph

6 days ago

To Stratford to dine at a new Japanese restaurant.
That's International, not upon-Avon, although dinner was somewhat Shakespearean – a tragi-comedy – and also an expensive mistake. And don't say I went there looking for trouble, keen to posture about east London tower blocks and expansive views of disused car parks.
As comfortable as the next person in a rural idyll of thatched roofs and lush green pastures, I get more than my fair share of them and am perfectly willing to acknowledge the ambition and striking modernity of vast glass-and-steel edifices strutting skywards between train track and urban shopping centre. If there's a gleaming, stylish Japanese restaurant there for brandishing sake, so much the better.
Kokin, on the seventh floor of the Stratford hotel, begins positively with its comfortable design – pastel shades, banquettes, the sight of a long bar and a fabulous garden terrace of pebbles, water and trees. The seven o'clock sunshine beat down on us out there and it augured well.
The amateurish barman was just charming; it seemed authentic that the young Japanese chap apparently didn't understand what a wine grape was, or that I might wish to try a wine, offering me a taste in a shot glass.
Similarly, once we had moved inside, our lovely waitress, who responded to my frantic waving (necessary even though other punters were scarce) by approaching our table and asking, 'Did you have a question about the nigiri?'
'No,' I replied, 'we'd just like to order.'
Thankfully, there was no choice involved (though the restaurant does offer à la carte options).
Omakase, where the chef selects your food for you, is one of the great treats in life. The 'leave it up to you' approach does come with an element of risk though, normally relating to cost. The bill at Kokin, however, proved to be the least of our worries.
For as dinner unfolded, I questioned what I had hitherto understood to be Japanese cuisine. The likes of gently melting sashimi and soft, tender sushi – were these but naive dips into that ocean-deep culture? Was Kokin's version – Japanese food in all its gritty glory: challenging raw fish, bold, wood-fired tuna, farmyard beef and barbecued ice cream – the real thing?
Well, I seriously hope not, because the only service this dinner provides to the uninitiated is a message to steer well clear of Japanese food (it would at least be a money-saving solution, a bit like persuading your kids that polo is a terrible sport…).
The misfortune began with a tray of edibles, including oysters wrecked by a quicksand of cloying sweet jelly and a purée of 'apple-smoked celeriac'. I'd rather eat the oyster shells than have to suffer that hell again.
There were a couple of things sheltering in pots to contain smoke, one of which – chawanmushi – was a savoury egg custard that smelt like someone had tripped over and spilt a pot of stock on a bonfire.
A colourful plate of sushi came next, its bright colours of orange and green camouflaging the raw fish in the centre. These were remarkably unpleasant, tough cuts of fish along with some of those large carabinero prawns – miraculously huge and rich shellfish, destroyed here by a tangy sauce and chopped chives.
Then came a cut of tuna, the bit a chef might usually chuck, or use for stock, we're told; the word 'sustainable' was duly brandished. It was cooked at a low temperature over fire. Oh my, was this frightful. It stank like the bottom of a boat unsweetened by diesel, tasted as bad, and its hue was worse, reminding me of the loo on a boat I once took from Bombay to Goa.
Wagyu beef followed, its barbecue flavour being more house-on-fire than cheffy grill. And then, at least, a decent DIY temae sushi dish, before dinner came to a suitable, calamitous conclusion: a sickly sweet pud with 'wood-fired ice cream'. It tasted like someone had stubbed out their fag in my Mr Whippy.