Tansy — The menu
Visual concept preview of the Restaurant Bistro template's Menu page: Tonight’s cooking in full — starters as written type, what the fire gets, what the set menus hold — and the kitchen’s honest small print. The sections below are a non-interactive composition of open-registry blocks.
Written at four each afternoon, once the boats and the market have said what there is. What follows is a fair picture of a night — the window on Weir Street has the real thing from five.
Small things first, made to be argued over in the middle of the table while the fire gets on with the mains. Six or so most nights; these are the shapes they take.
Shucked to order at the counter, with cider vinegar and not lemon.
On dripping toast, under pickled onions sliced thin enough to read through.
The seven o’clock bake, burnt butter, and salt Joan carries back from the far side of the estuary.
Charred on the plancha and dressed at the last second, while you watch.
Sliced thin off the bone, with pickled gooseberries when Ada’s garden has them.
Out of the walled garden that morning, with salt and what is left of the brown butter.
- Six or seven small plates at the top of the menu, most nights
- By the dozen oysters at the counter, counted on the slate
- One bake of bread a day — when it is gone, it is gone
Mains come off the wood fire at the back of the pass. Most nights there are five; these are the three shapes the middle of the menu takes.
Whole, over the coals, finished with green sauce. Sized for two people who like each other.
Ten days in the cold room, cooked dark, carved at the counter — bones to the dog you promised.
Whatever Ada’s walled garden sent, cooked over the same fire with the same attention as the beef. Ask Joan what it is tonight when you book.
Two ways to hand the night to the kitchen, and Sunday, which runs by its own rules. All of it is counted in courses, not choices — tell us what you cannot eat and Etta writes the rest.
The early sitting
Wednesday to Friday, the whole table in by half six
- A start, a main, and the tart
- Written for the table, not the person
- The night’s bread and butter included
The counter menu
The kitchen decides, course by course
- Everything the market gave us that morning
- The counter’s running commentary included
- Ends when the kitchen says it ends
Sunday lunch
From twelve, until the beef runs out
- The rib carved at the counter
- Children get the same menu, smaller
- The tart is not negotiable
The kitchen’s small print, stated plainly.
The window on Weir Street has tonight’s menu from five. The phone has Joan from three. Between the two of them you will know everything we do.