This week the Smoked Kitchen at The Malt Cross on St James’ Street is launching it’s new menu, taking locally sourced meats, smoked on the premises, combined with locally sourced produce.

They very kindly invited us along to have a taste of some of the new menu items, meet the chef, and some of their suppliers; the excellent Owen Taylor & Sons Butchers, and The Fruit Basket

A selection of dishes from the Menu

This rather beautiful picture was the official press release photograph of the food on the new menu. I am not sure of all the official menu names but basically what you see here from top right to bottom left was as follows.

Top Right is the ‘Smoked Double-Dipped Pulled Brisket Sandwich’ and Top Left is the ‘Smoked Pulled Pork Hotdog’.

On the bottom right you have the ‘Malt Cross Pulled Pork Hash with a Fried Hens Egg’, Bottom Centre was the House Salad with local stilton, walnuts, sun dried tomato and mixed leaves, and Bottom Right was the ‘Nottinghamshire Pulled Pork with Bramley apple’

Everything on the boards, plates, and bowl looked great visually but I expect that you want to know how it all tasted?

‘Smoked Double-Dipped Pulled Brisket Sandwich’  and the ‘Nottinghamshire Pulled Pork with Bramley apple’

The ‘Smoked Double-Dipped Pulled Brisket Sandwich’  is described as their ‘take on the classic American French’. They take their ‘signature pulled beef brisket’ and pile it high onto a brioche bun with sliced gherkins and onions. It is ‘drenched in its own cooking juices’. This is served with skin on fries and a dressed side salad. That beef brisket was packed with a nice well balanced smoke. This was a pretty big sized portion and that bun was huge, you might need to approach this with a decent appetite in hand.

The ‘Nottinghamshire Pulled Pork with Bramley apple’ was a very simple dish with the Pulled Pork served on a nice bit of crunchy toast. It was served with a nice salad of mixed leaves and a really nice tart and tangy Bramley apple sauce. That apple sauce was really good, but the pulled pork has quite a subtle and light smoke so it might over power. I say might that could just be my take on the dish

Malt Cross Pulled Pork Hash with a Fried Hens Egg 

The ‘Malt Cross Pulled Pork Hash with a Fried Hens Egg’ was described as a ‘Hand-shaped smoked pork has cake pan roasted to a crisp golden brown and topped with a fried egg’. Visually this was one of the most striking dishes on the table.

I am a bit of a slut for a fried egg on anything. I think I would even enjoy a fried egg on top of another fried egg. It is something about the way that a soft runny egg yolk makes such a great natural sauce when it oozes over whatever it sits upon. This dish is no exception.

I liked the soft hash cake, and the smokiness from the pulled pork was subtle and slightly understated. This would be a pretty good brunch dish when you are caught in the moment when you are too late for the all-day-breakfast but still need something in that family to comfort you.

‘Smoked Pulled Pork Hotdog’

The ‘Smoked Pulled Pork Hotdog’ was actually not a bad Hot Dog at all. I am quite fussy when places try to pass off a regular sausage as a Hot Dog. This one was actually pretty close to the sort of ‘dogs’ I was used to eating in the States. They described the dish as  ‘In-house smoked hotdog topped with our pulled pork, served with skin on fries, pickles, and homemade coleslaw’.

You basically got the ‘snap’ you expect from this sort of encased meat in a tube combined with a good smoky taste, the sausage is topped with more of that pulled pork. Not sure if you need both, but I suppose that its kind of a 2-4-1 deal if you cannot decide what you want. All I have to say is please don’t put ketchup on this hot dog, as that would be a crime.

Now I know that we do not always want to have pulled pork or the such like when we go out to eat at the pub. So it was good to see that they will also be serving some of your pub classics, like ‘Fish and Chips’, and ‘Sausage and Mash’.

The menu also has Chicken and Chips and one of your classic build your own burger options too.

If you can get out of bed and into town before 12 you will be happy to know (well I was) that they will also be serving up a good traditional breakfast in the mornings.

I quite liked the flavours of the Smoked Kitchen and will be in to try them out for real, but also very keen to try some of their pub classics as well.

I am often in the Malt Cross on a Friday night drinking their beer and I always bring friends from out of town here as well to drink the beer.

Perhaps next time I will suggest that we have something to eat.

The Malt Cross is located at 16 St James’s St, Nottingham NG1 6FG, just a short walk from the Old Market Square and also down from Maid Marian Way

Check the Malt Cross out on Twitter and Facebook

Check the Smoked Kitchen out on Twitter  and Facebook

Just for the record this sampling of the menu was complimentary

but I bought my own beer.