Photo by Ewan-M

Duck heart and tongues with celeriac and pine is not a dish for the faint-hearted. It might work for the red-blooded though because it turns out that a bisected duck’s heart looks much like a vulva. I know this because I was recently served the aforementioned dish as part of a six course tasting menu at Viajante. Course number three in fact – right on the threshold between foreplay and the main event.

As to whether it tastes like one, neither my dinner date nor I are well-placed to say. What I can tell you is that Viajante is the kind of restaurant where, if you are overcome by a fit of the giggles when presented with a plateful of fowl offal resembling female genitalia, you can style it out without raising any eyebrows.

Because despite the hype, the achingly hip decor, the too cool for skool staff and the recently awarded Michelin star, Viajante doesn’t take itself too seriously. Nuno Mendez’s gastronomic outpost in Bethnal Green eschews an a la carte menu in favour of ‘challenging’ 6, 9 or 12 course tasting menus served with a lightness of touch and a slightly knowing wink.

I suspect that if we’d confided in the affable, knowledgeable staff about our vulva observation they would have sniggered too. And I liked them all the more for not making us feel like either lightweights or cheapskates when we asked if we could share a wine pairing menu between us.

And so to the food. If you’re reading this blog the chances are you’ve already read plenty of treatises on Mendez’s cuisine, all unanimous in their praise for his imagination and execution.

Anyone who can make the emetic combination of parsnips poached in milk served with lager infused tapioca, reduced milk ice cream and olive tapenade crumble palatable is certainly a genius, if not an alchemist. Anyone who challenges you to guess the ingredients (as the man himself did) has to be pretty confident in his ability to confound.

The only fault line to emerge between my dinner date and me centred on a controversial white chocolate truffle, infused with cep mushrooms. I thought the unlikely marriage between cloying sweetness and umami savouriness really worked. He thought Relate needed to intervene. Some you win…

We both agreed, however, that if you’re suspicious of molecular gastronomy, of fine dining and of haute cuisine, Viajante is a good place to start. Yes it’s a bit pretentious, yes at times the food is more ‘bemuse’ than ‘amuse bouche’ and no, it’s certainly not cheap. But it is surprisingly informal and accessible. And, more to the point, it’s very very good.

Viajante, Patriot Square, Bethnal Green, London