Beef Review - Table For Two

But enough food to feed an army. Andrew and Jodie Johnston are new BBQ magazine columnists, with the couple searching out the best live-fire restaurants around the world. Better start with a table for three, as RUPERT BATES joins them

48 hours later freshly crowned Open champion Brian Harman was in the same restaurant, working through the BBQ menu and drinking from the Claret Jug.

Welcome to Beef and Jodie, BBQ magazine’s new columnists, reviewing fire food restaurants and BBQ joints around the world. This is a marriage made in food heaven, with their first meeting a sliding doors moment, as Beef missed the cut at the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth.

“An old housemate of Jodie had a date with my caddy, so I went out with them for drinks, to drown my disappointment at missing the cut – and Jodie was there,” said Beef.

It was love, or maybe hunger, at first sight, as Beef promised to take Jodie to his favourite restaurants and there were soon off to Hawksmoor in London – home to great, well, beef.

We are talking at Brat, the Basque- inspired, wood-fired restaurant in Shoreditch, east London where fire gods cook under Vulcan himself, Tomos Parry, who also recently opened Mountain in Soho and a restaurant already hailed by The Times critic Giles Coren as ‘the most exciting restaurant to open in England this year’.

Actually, there was more eating than talking at Brat; the food so rapturously received and devoured, I half expected the neighbouring table to tell the waitress: ‘We’ll have what they’re having.’

Padron peppers, spider crab toast and smoked cod roe with leeks to start with. Brief pause between mouthfuls. When did BBQ food first enter your consciousness?

“My earliest memories were at home with my parents throwing baby back ribs, Chinese five spice chicken drumsticks and sausages on the barbecue,” said Jodie.

For Andrew it was on his early travels to the United States.

Conversation stopped again, replaced by gasps of delight as cucumber mackerel and lamb chops arrived. Then came the beef ribs – we’re gonna need a bigger table - and the turbot, with Brat an old English word for turbot.

Don’t tell my cardiologist, but if there was a food for honours system, I’d even put Brat’s bread and burnt onion butter in the House of Lords.

This must have come close to the perfect BBQ meal, but Jodie’s dream line up would include roasted leeks and sweet, spicy and sticky beef short ribs, while Beef would plump for fire-cooked white prawns and a Galician beef chop with fire-roasted peppers and kale.

“At home Beef is in charge of the meat tongs, but I rule the vegetables.”

Home, with their daughter Harley, is on the Algarve in Portugal, just 20 minutes the Spanish border, hopping back and forth to sample the Iberian fire cooking.

“Just being outside makes us feel so alive, cooking up tasty meals for family and friends,” said Beef.

A food blog – @cheapeatsandsteepeats on Instagram – was born, as they decided to chronicle the great food and drink they found on their global odysseys.

“Having travelled to more than 20 countries over the years, we wanted to spread and appreciate the love and passion that goes into cooking and the incredible work of chefs around the world – be it a Michelin Star restaurant, a hidden gem down a back street, or a battered food truck on the pavement,” said Beef.

Their reviews also take in small independent coffee shops and bakeries, while cocktails and wine feature heavily too, with Jodie partial to a martini and Rosé and Pinot Noir from the wine list. Beef would start with a Riesling, followed by a Cabernet Sauvignon to wash his BBQ food down.

“Every day’s a school day when it comes to learning about food cultures and flavours and we love bringing home those experiences and recreating them,” said Jodie.

Fire is therapy too, nourishing the soul as well as the belly, using all the senses. “For us it is mindfulness, especially when it comes to slow cooks, and so good for mental health and wellbeing.”

Beef, a winner of the Spanish Open in 2016, the same year he finished 8th in the Open at Royal Troon, is currently out with a hand injury, but hoping to return in November. He was summarising for Sky Sports during this year’s Open at Hoylake, proving hugely entertaining and knowledgeable on the morning shows during the tournament. Next stop is a trip to watch the Ryder Cup in Rome, so expect some wood-fired pizza reviews.

Professional golf will take the couple to grazing pastures new around the world, plotting culinary paths as well as ones around the courses.

You suspect Beef’s scorecards will have restaurant recommendations scribbled on them, picking the brains of the local players and caddies, embracing the universal language of BBQ and live-fire cooking.

The first-ever Beefstock golf festival was held in the summer at Beef’s club North Middlesex. And, yes, there was a barbecue.

“I have bigger plans for next year. Let’s get a whole cow going, Asado-style, for a start,” said Beef. Fun is never far away with Beef and Jodie. As the Irish proverb says: ‘Laughter is brightest where food is best.’

“We are delighted to join BBQ magazine as regular columnists. There is nothing better than food hit by fire.”

Initially published by the BBQ Magazine