Roganic is a restaurant by Simon Rogan in Marylebone, London.  He is known for the innovative food served in his restaurant L’Enclume situated in the faraway Lake District in northwest England.

The restaurant is referred to as “pop-up” in the press and it is accordingly sparsely decorated as it only has a 2-year lease.

The staff was very friendly, the atmosphere informal. There were four of us, two on Olympics-related businesses and we were on vacation to see the Games.

Those who were on business arrived late by almost half an hour, they were excused as their responsibilities were more-or-less round the clock. Three types of rolls were served as soon as all were seated. The flavors of the bread were different but the texture were all the same. Amuse bouche soon followed.

We were hungry by that time and curious about the chef’s creations – so we all went for the 10-course tasting menu. They also offered a 6-course regular as well as a 6-course vegetarian menu. First course was Peas with beef tongue, dill and calamint.  Sue did not want beef tongue so that they substituted it with artichoke – which is the version of this dish on the vegetarian menu.

Grown-up yolk from the golden egg, celeriac and garlic. We forgot the explanation.

Keen’s dumpling, cream of onion, nausturtiums and liquorice powder. The brown spots in the bowl matched the sprinkled on liquorice powder.

This dish is the most visually-striking of the evening. Raw mackeral in coal oil, lovage, and gooseberries. Coal oil and lovage ?

Grilled salad smoked over embers, truffle custard and cobnuts. “I” who was on business spent a good 15 minutes on the phone to deal with an emerging situation, poor girl, so we were eating exceedingly slowly.  The restaurant staff politely told us that we should hurry a bit as the kitchen was “concerned”. They were very nice about it and we were ok with the suggestion, after all, we started late.

Razors with sea herbs, turnips, and pearl barley. A change of background color of the plate was not a bad idea but the plate was very japanese-y.

Chick ‘O’ Hake, beetroots, red orach, sorrel and cockles. If I remember correctly, it was a piece of grilled crispy chicken skin(?) on top of a chunk of fish.

Reg’s duck breast with yellow beans, sweetbreads, sage and corn.

Douglas fir, cherries, goat’s milk, and pennyroyal.

Hazelnuts and sweet cheese, rosehips and anise hyssop.

A total of 41 ingredients were mentioned in the menu. We have not eaten a meal like this before where a English-language dictionary was needed to explain many of the British vegetables that went into the dishes.

Since the four of us had not seen each other for a long time, we were spending more time chatting than tasting. It was a shame that we cannot remember more about the tastes as a lot of efforts must have gone into designing the dishes. If you are an adventurous diner, it is certainly worth a try.

We were the last guests to leave Roganic and it was so late that we completely missed the Olympics beach volley ball evening competitions.