What can you tell us about Zoilo?
It's the first restarant venture by Argentinian chef patron Diego Jacquet who's also behind the Casa Maleva catering company. The intention here is to showcase Argentine food in a a menu of small sharing dishes and a wholly Argentine wine list.
Where is it?
Just behind Selfridges on Duke Street - making it a particularly handy spot for a lunchtime shopping pitstop.
Where should we meet for a drink beforehand?
You're not exactly spoilt for choice on drinking holes in this neighbourhood. There's always 28:50 around the corner on Marylebone Lane or perhaps either the Wonder Bar or the bar at Hix both in Selfridges.
Where should I sit?
Those in the know head downstairs where the best seats in the house are up at the counter watching the chefs at work. This is a calm, organised kitchen, so don't worry that your meal will be punctuated by rants from a shouty chef - it's just more fun to eat here. There's also a nice-sized private dining room here too - perfect for 8-10 people.
Is bread included?
It certainly is - our basket included a range of gorgeous homemade breads including one studded with tomatoes and olives.
What should I eat?
Our lunchtime order began with a dish of braised pigs head cheese and quince - which turned out to be two lovely piggy croquettes, deep fried and served up with a quince-based dipping sauce. Provoleta cheese came baked in a weeny 'frying' pan fragrant with honey and almonds. We followed that up with probably our favourite dish - pork belly with chorizo and a butterflied prawn all smokey and chargrilled from the grill.
Diego oversaw our steak order, urging us to try the two cuts of skirt and flank both of which are slow cooked using the sous vide, and then finished off on the parilla. The skirt came with tiny cubed parsnips and ribbons of deep-fried parsnip crisps, the flank with pureed celeriac and bone marrow. Smile nicely at your waiter and see if they'll also give you a pot of Zoilo's fabulous chimichurry that normally accompanies the ribeye - it's worth asking for. It goes without saying that we had the famous Zoilo chips to go with these - which were utter heaven, fried to perfection and topped with social life impairing amounts of garlic and parsley.
By rights, we should have finished our meal here, but we couldn't resist the lure of the milk cake - soaked sweet sponge served with a spoonful of intense passionfruit sorbet.
And what about the drink?
They're passionate about their Argentine wine here - the list is exclusively Argentinian, with plenty to try by the glass and carafe. An enthusiastic sommelier persuaded us away from the ones we were familiar with and matched our lunches with a glass of Serbal Malbec 2011 and Decero Malbec 2010 both of which went down a treat.
Overall thoughts
Central London openings like Zoilo and relative neighbour Donostia are turning this part of town which used to be either all hotels, or high end restaurants or - at the other end - low mass market tourist spots into a much more interesting place to eat out. Zoilo does have a bit of split personality - the bustling cafe atmosphere upstairs is a complete contrast to the more grown-up counter dining downstairs - but the menu is brilliantly put together. Come here and graze on a glass of wine, some cheese and the empanadas or set aside more time to work through the other parts of the menu and put that grill to work.
Zoilo - 9 Duke Street, London W1U 3EG - Find out more about Zoilo
Prices were correct at time of writing. Hot Dinners were invited to eat at Zoilo.
