Maison Bab restaurant review: If we insist on reinventing the kebab, this has stayed truest to its spirit

The food is unfussy and most probably better than your usual doner. But if you are missing that, there’s a replica facade of a high street kebab shop downstairs to help you transition, says Ed Cumming

There is something laudable unfussy about the new sister restaurant of Le Bab (Photos Justin de Souza)

Maison Bab feels confident, perhaps in part because the people behind it have had a while to practise. Its sister restaurant Le Bab has been doling out smart twists on kebabs for a few years.

Sadly, its location, on the top floor of Kingly Court, off Carnaby Street, means you only really end up there if you get lost on the way to Ben Sherman.

The new outpost is harder to miss. It is in Covent Garden’s Mercer Walk development, which also includes the latest outpost of Neil Rankin’s Temper group.

When you walk into Maison Bab, immediately in front of you is a large open kitchen.

Those dining alone or in pairs can sit at the counter and watch meats being carved, breads being baked and sauces being dolloped. Most diners eat in this room, which is brighter and more airy than you might expect given the cuisine.

Things are slightly odder downstairs, where a fine-dining zone sits behind a replica facade of a high street kebab shop.

When I first visited, soon after it opened, the service had not quite bedded in. I had to eat a number of fondue-covered chips without a drink to wash them down. We must all suffer for our art.

On two more recent visits, everything clicked. Covent Garden is not somewhere you would have thought many kebabs were eaten at lunch, but on both occasions there was a humming crowd by 1pm.

Affordable lunch deals are sure to bring people in (Justin de Souza)

They have introduced a reasonable £10 lunch menu, which must help, but it is also to do with the space, which feels somehow light: all clean lines and simple decoration.

There is less lightness when it comes to the dishes. Several dishes feature a rich Iskender tomato sauce, punchy with red peppers.

One, a flatbread, also comes swimming in meat butter, a substance that invites prompt consumption lest you dwell too long on what it will do inside you. The other stand-out starters are deep fried doner beignets, all hard crunch and soft meat.

Mains of kebabs and sandwiches are ostensibly simple: chicken shish, barbequed mutton, lamb adana and some vegetarian options. The highlight is a 15-hour pork shawarma, wrapped simply with a cucumber relish, the meat roasted to a point of high succulence.

There is no shortage of restaurateurs trying to elevate the kebab. Last year we were treated to the unedifying spectacle of Fanny’s, which advertised “posh kebabs” to the good burghers of Stoke Newington before having a rethink.

The highlight of the menu is this 15-hour pork shawarma (Justin de Souza)

No doubt some purists will claim the kebabs can’t be improved on from those served up at establishments in Green Lanes, or the drunk-magnet dino-leg next to their local pub. I’m not sure that’s true.

Of all the places I’ve been to that have tried to “premiumise” the flatbread and meat experience, Maison Bab has stayed truest to the spirit of the food. There is something laudably unfussy about it: fresh ingredients, large flavours, and no sense you are doing anything dirty.

I’ll be back, probably before I return to the honest doner at the end of the road.

Around £25 a head for starters, kebabs and a beer.

Should you go? Yes
Would I go again? Yes

Maison Bab, Covent Garden, 4 Mercer Walk, London WC2H; maisonbab.com; 020 7240 9781