Review: Should I Visit Pearly Cow in Margate?
“The extra-chunky beef-fat chips being so good that you’d happily introduce them to your mates as ‘the one’.”
While it’s going to be a lot more difficult to find the right weather to sit out on the terrace and enjoy the views of Margate’s Main Sands in the winter months, the Pearly Cow restaurant at the new No.42 hotel is still offering fantastic food in a beautiful setting.
We went for a lunch, and sharing plates is the ideal way to do things IMO - you get a flavour of as much as you can! And believe me when I say, there was a helluva lot of flavours to enjoy.
You can’t start without bread, so the freshly-baked sourdough from nearby Modern Provider, paired with ethereal butter direct from Cranbrook’s Hinxden Farm Dairy, kicked things off (£4).
Seafood comes from Kent and Sussex staple Chapman’s and the light salt cod taco, with spots of parsley mayonnaise and preserved lemon (£3.50), are just a mouthful each, but one that leaves you thinking. Notorious designer and socialite Nicky Haslam released his ‘common list for 2023’ (due to be released on tea towels) recently and said that the phrase ‘moreish’ should be banished. Well, he can snob-off, because the salt cod tacos are frickin’ moreish.
The namesake dish on the menu, The Pearly Cow is a 45-day-aged Kentish fillet of beef tartare topped with whipped Whitstable oyster cream, which is in turn sprinkled with Exmoor caviar (£17). It’s luxurious but, oh my goodness, it is terribly good. Served with more charred sourdough (you’ve got to indulge haven’t you), it’s a dish not to miss.
The sides are carefully created, with the extra-chunky beef-fat chips being so good that you’d happily introduce them to your mates as ‘the one’. Topped with dijonnaisse and chives (£8) almost a meal on their own. Finally, the Cornish crab with avocado and grapefruit (£14) is a proper fresh taste of the sea and absolutely befits the setting. The effort that goes into sourcing and presentation is super real, but the chilled vibe and relaxed service (I was in shorts and my guest in a kilt) sets the whole experience off perfectly. Style.
