The popular Les 2 Garçons occupies a relatively small site on Middle Lane, Crouch End, north London, that was an Italian trattoria and then a fish shop before assuming its current identity as a bistro de quartier in May 2023.
It’s run and owned by two men who have between them almost 80 years of restaurant experience. There is a thin Frenchman, Jean-Christophe Slowik, known as JC, who began his career as a sommelier at Harvey’s in Wandsworth but was almost immediately promoted to general manager when his predecessor left after a disagreement with its then-chef Marco Pierre White. En route, he has also run L’Absinthe in Primrose Hill.
Then there is the chef Robert Reid, who fulfils my late father’s definition of ‘a chef you can trust’. He is plump and has what can best be described as a jolly disposition. He certainly laughs a lot, hiding perhaps a sometimes-darker side.
Born in South Africa, Reid followed what was then the only possible route out. As a young chef in the now-closed Carlton Hotel in Johannesburg, he entered culinary competitions, won them and secured a stage under Roger Vergé at the esteemed Moulin de Mougins near Cannes on the French Riviera. From there he moved to Paris and cooked alongside Michael Caines and Gordon Ramsay in Joël Robuchon’s restaurant.
I must have eaten Reid’s classical French food at The Oak Room in Le Méridien hotel in London under the aegis of Marco Pierre White (him again) in the mid 1990s, in a restaurant that won the highest accolades. Reid met Slowik there and then, after a few years, moved. Staying within the confines of French cuisine, but with the aim of feeding large numbers, he became head chef at Keith McNally’s Balthazar in Covent Garden which on a normal day could feed 1,600, with a successful bakery next door. ‘There comes a time when the challenge of numbers becomes a fascination in itself’, he told me when I met him after we’d enjoyed dinner at Les 2 Garçons one hot night recently.
After a while, not surprisingly, Reid felt ‘burnt out’ and decided that life without the pressures of an extremely busy restaurant suited him better. He had remarried, became a father to a daughter and a son who may follow in his father’s footsteps and was looking around for possible venues. He remembered Slowik’s wine expertise and gave him a ring when he had found a temporary restaurant space in Crouch End and needed help with writing a wine list. As ever, it was the timing of the phone call that was critical: Slowik joined Reid and the first, small iteration of Les 2 Garçons (now celebrated on this postcard) was born.
‘This was planned as a pop-up’, Reid explained. ‘The rent was £300 a week; it only sat 20; all the induction ovens were from IKEA; and we financed it in part via crowdfunding. Oh, and there was no dishwasher. We all used to do the washing up. But we laid out certain principles: the menu would be French, all the classics and more, and where, crucially, the chefs would double up as waiters, to carry the food from the kitchen and serve it. After all, these are my customers and I would very much like to get to know them.’
When the building that housed the restaurant was repossessed by its owners, Les 2 Garçons needed a new home and in May 2023 they moved to their current location. Via their own channels, they organised an even more ambitious crowdfunding operation to finance the necessary investment, over £70,000 being raised from a group of well-wishers, whose names are listed on the restaurant’s Founders Wall.
The small kitchen, with barely enough room for the four chefs working in it, is situated midway between the two dining rooms, with the smaller of the two up a flight of stairs at the rear. Watching Reid and Slowik waiting for the kitchen to hand out the finished plates, surrounded by their supporting waiter and waitress, reminded me forcefully of the traffic trying to get round Hyde Park Corner at rush hour. And that was before two much younger chefs decided not to be left out of the obvious fun and walked out carrying desserts to several tables.
The interior owes a great deal to the judicious eye of Reid’s wife, Jen. Two old but now repainted garage doors opposite the front door act as the medium from which a curtain is hung. The lighting is sensitive and there are odd French touches – the bunches of onions hanging by the racks full of wine glasses is one – with the strangest addition of a floor-to-ceiling cast-iron pillar right by the kitchen. Now painted a deep gold, it has mysterious origins but we all agreed it was an essential ingredient. Along with the French determinedly spoken by many of the serving staff, including JC, it gives this enclave of Crouch End the air of Paris’s 9th arrondissement. Perhaps that’s part of the appeal?
The menu itself is straightforward and covers the basics: an excellent French onion soup (‘topping very good’ according to JR; £9.95); snails; entrecôte and frites; a couple of fish dishes; a vegetarian main course; and a baba au rhum, here glazed with apricots (£10). The excitement is provided by the three specials boards that are hung on a wall and written in chalk (easy to rub out when the specials have run out).
From these I chose a concentrated fish soup, its richness of flavour partly offset by the crispness of the croutons and the tanginess of the rouille served alongside.
I followed this with a Longhorn steak tartare, nice and spicy, and very good frites (it was a hot evening both outside and inside the restaurant). This was so generously served and so well-seasoned that we brought the rest home for our lunch the next day, although Reid was worried because it was raw. Again from the specials, I chose a nougat glacé that was delicious: sweet, tart and crunchy from the hazelnuts that surrounded it. With a somewhat unusually-sized 460-ml carafe of Morgon Les Charmes from J-M Lafont 2022 (£38) my bill came to a reasonable £133.26.
‘I really like the way in which the dishes that we put on the specials board have come to dominate’, Reid explained. ‘It forces my chefs to be imaginative, to be creative, and it provides opportunities for the customer to return and experiment. It also reduces waste.’
There was considerable talk of cuisine grandmère as Reid expounded and it was obvious where this emphasis has come from: not just his training in Paris and the West End of London but also as a chef who has had to start again and almost work his way up to the top for the third time.
The reasonable pricing has helped but Reid is equally proud of the manner in which he and Slowik have come to understand and accommodate those who live and work in Crouch End and close by. ‘There is absolutely no market for our style of restaurant at lunchtime; there are too many cafés around. So we are open for dinner Tuesday to Saturday and Saturday lunch. And twice a month we now open on a Friday lunch: one service is for fish lovers that begins with a bouillabaisse and the other is for meat lovers, when we cook entrecôte for everyone. They’re good fun and always fully booked’, Reid ended with yet another smile.
The food, wine and service at Les 2 Garçons offer extremely good value true to its owners’ ambitions and is clearly appreciated by the locals. At the table next to ours, after a first course, two young men washed down a huge serving of a leg of lamb with dauphinoise potatoes and wild mushrooms brought to them by the genial Reid in a large, slightly battered pan with a bottle of rosé and then each of them polished off an enormous bowl of a rich chocolate mousse!
Les 2 Garçons 14 Middle Lane, London N8 8PL; tel: +44 (0)20 8347 9834
Photo at top courtesy Les 2 Garçons.
Every Sunday, Nick writes about restaurants. To stay abreast of his reviews, sign up for our weekly newsletter.
