Metro, Food & Drink, Eating Out, 29th July 2009
Pub grub fit for the king
Joanna Blythman

Those under 25 who walk into Allan Mawn's new joint on Dumbarton Road might think that they have walked into a museum rather than a hip bar diner. That's not a criticism from a fresh-faced young Turk. I'm too old to have knowingly worn my trousers at a fashionable half-mast. It's just that Velvet Elvis is full of things that will be completely alien to people born after the mid-1980s.

Take the name. It refers to kitsch pictures of Elvis painted on velvet. They were popular in the 1970s. One of Mawn's own Velvises hangs on the wall. It's not a great likeness but then I suspect that for many under-25s, Elvis is only recognisable from the JXL remix of a Little Less Conversation.

This place was a second hand furniture shop when Mawn got the keys but, as he stripped away the fittings and fixtures, an old butcher's shop revealed itself, another anachronism in our pre-packaged world. The tiled walls and butcher's hooks hanging from the ceiling have been incorporated into its new look along with a jukebox, a primative, non-portable anscestor of the iPod.

The menus come stuck to the back of laminated record sleeves, a device once used to sheath vinyl discs, themselves a more chunky forerunner of the MP3 file. Perhaps the biggest shock for younger readers will be that only a very small proportion of the dishes listed are available as tapas.

Next door to Velvet Elvis is Pintxo, Mawn's other operation, winner of Metro's 2007 Newcomer Award and the only tapas bar in Glasgow likely to provoke a smile of recognition from a visiting Spaniard. Apart from a handful of bar snacks imported from next door, Velvet Elvis bodyswerves the restaurant trade's current pash for tapas-sized portions in favour of heart servings of upmarket pub grub.

Burgers (£8.95), fish and chips (£9.95), steak frites (£12.95) and steak pies (£9.95) all feature alongside slightly more bistro-esque starters such as poached eggs, Stornoway black pud and asparagus (£4.95/£7.95) and main courses including slow-cooked oxtail (£9.95). It's mostly what you want to see on a pub menu but, as far as possible, it is seasonal, prepared on the premises, sustainable and free-range rather than frozen, imported, bought cheaply, boiled in the bag and marked up. It's what pub grub should be but seldom is.

Mostly it works. The smoked makarel pate (£4.95) was smooth, punchy and fresh. A little side salad of vibrant samphire and sea parsley was unusual in that it was more than a garnish and actually added to the flavour of the dish. I was less convinced by a big portion of beefy mussels (£5.95) in a cider and cream sauce. The bivalves were fine but the cider made it sharp and sour, lacking the richness of the more usual wine and cream combo. Some bread would have been nice to go along with it.

A Niciose salad (£7.95) was He Man-sized, well dressed and crunchy in all the right places. You could argue forever whether a Nicoise should feature tinned or fresh tuna. This one boasted a healthy slab of seared fresh tuna.

I had a gutsy dish of confit duck leg (£10.95) on a mix of Puy lentils, tomato and spinach. It was hearty, satidfying peasant food that made this urban keyboard jockey smile.

I don't know that Velvet Elvis will make the same splash as Pintxo did because it's not quite such a ground breaking idea. Instead, it's an enjoyably quirky neighbourhood hang-out that has raised the bar for pub grub no matter which side of 25 you happen to be on.

Jonathan Trew

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