What's the draw
Handling doesn't do easy dishes – every plate at his new restaurant in the Old Truman Brewery is crammed with aesthetic and culinary detail, but a lot more fun than that makes it sound. Look out for the chef doing his thing behind a pass-meets-DJ-booth graffitied with the Frog's bright green amphibian logo…
What to drink
The chef's gin and tonic comes loaded with dill (in an appropriately bright-green colour) and it's a winner. There are plenty of craft beers, too, plus a strong but compact wine list that stays on the approachable side of interesting. They also serve kombucha brewed on site by one of the team, using a recipe so secret apparently even Handling doesn't know it.
What to eat
The 9-course tasting menu (or 10 if you go for the £4 cheese donuts, which you will, because why wouldn't you?) is decent value at £45, and tells you pretty much everything you need to know about Handling's style. Beetroot, beetroot and more beetroot is an achingly pretty dish where cylinders of beetroot panna cotta, filled with pickled and roasted beetroot, are liberally dusted with beetroot powder, while onglet beef with artichoke and black garlic leaves no flavour unextracted from its ingredients – it's seriously good.
Tasting menu (9 courses) £45; wines from £19.55 by the bottle. 2 Ely's Yard, Old Truman Brewery, Hanbury Street, E1 6QR; thefrogrestaurant.com
