Ed Eats

Brass & Knuckle
Oratory Street,
Naxxar
Tel 2722 2722

Food: 7/10  
Service: 8/10
Ambience: 8/10
Value: 7/10
Overall: 7.5/10

We’ve all had days we wish we didn’t have to endure. For those of us enslaved within the working classes, we usually call this kind of day a Monday. We feel like whatever belief system we’ve picked for ourselves has forsaken us and lumped us with delays, meetings we’d rather have avoided, unsolicited calls, and too much of the colour pink.

In short, you are dealt a concentration of whatever it is that irritates you. It’s tempting to blame the stars (if you’re into the whole astrology thing), your boss, your husband (and heaven forbid they’re one and the same), or a client from hell.

There is another way. Plan a brief escape, make sure it can happen, and fill your escape time with good food. We underestimate the ability of food to change our mood but if you stop to think for a while, you can surely conjure up the image of a dish that has the magical ability to make you feel better.

If you’ve read that and made up an excuse for your inability to do such a thing, you just need to think harder. “But I’m only allowed half an hour for lunch,” or “my favourite dish costs far too much,” are not really reasons to keep yourself from this kind of therapy. If you were to ask your boss for an extension of lunch break to visit a therapist, you’d most likely be granted the extension. Just be careful not to mention that your therapist comes in the form of your favourite chef.

And if you have so many bad days that you feel you need your special dish every day, then you could start thinking about changing jobs.

I’m quite lucky with this kind of therapy, mainly because there is an unbelievably broad variety of foods that have the ability to make me happy. I also don’t have too many terrible days but that’s a different story for another time.

Well, I was having an awkward Monday. I was sitting across a table from a man whose profession I abhor. The table was made of highly reflective glass, so it was like there were two of him. My mind drifted, seeking solutions for my predicament. Fight or flight. Food or food. Fight and food. Brass knuckles.

That needs a little explaining. Brass knuckles, for those of you who seek non-violent solutions, are a set of matching pieces of cast brass with four circular hoops in them. Fingers go through the four hoops, fist is clenched over the inner metal brace, and you now have a much more effective fist to deal damage with. It is the weapon of gangsters who prefer their combat up close and personal.

A beautifully indulgent take on the cornerstone of rapid dining

I’d been meaning to visit Brass & Knuckle in Naxxar for a while now and it took an uncharacteristic train of thought on my behalf to get down to it. I pulled myself together during that dreadful meeting, bolstered by the prospect of a lovely lunch. I planned to meet the better half for lunch anyway so all it took was a text with the name of the restaurant.

There’s nothing particularly violent about Brass & Knuckle. That ampersand (the little squiggle that we read as ‘and’) does the trick and turns a weapon into an innocuous and memorable name. The idea behind the restaurant isn’t entirely novel but it does seem to be executed to a very high level. It effectively combines a butcher’s shop, a deli counter, and a kitchen into a single source of happiness.

We were greeted by a young lady who was cheerful and bubbly and helpful. She brought menus and, when I asked about the steak, she explained that I could either order with her or go to the butcher’s counter and pick my own steak. They price steak in as transparent a way as possible. You pay the price per kilo of the cut you’ve chosen, just like if you were going to take it home and cook it yourself. They then add a €6 fee for grilling it. Sides are charged separately.

There is a menu that includes a bunch of rather attractively priced snacks like wraps and sandwiches. As tempting as these sounded, what with the terribly enticing deli counter in full view, my nose had picked a hint of grilled meat and there was no turning back. Also, when I’m eating to make a poor day better, a steak does a better job than a sandwich.

When our young lady returned to take our order I asked for her advice, curious to see where she’s lead me given a free rein. She immediately steered me away from the Charolais and towards the Angus. I had Charolais cows for neighbours this summer and she was helping them live another day.

I asked whether anything was dry aged and she guided me towards the bone-in ribeye. This girl knows what’s going on in the kitchen and her knowledge and demeanour contributed significantly to our experience. She asked about my preferred cooking temperature and I said that rare should be good. Blue is a little too cold for such a fatty cut, but anything more than rare would be a shame.

Even if they cost a fiver, I added the truffled fries to my order. There’s something undeniably indulgent about truffles and potatoes.

The better half, possibly by way of a challenge, picked the slow-cooked pork cheeks. It’s a bit like watching the Maltese grandma try someone else’s baked macaroni – feigned enthusiasm for the dish is nothing but thinly veiled scorn for anyone’s take on their own masterpiece.

Our food took a short while but was served within a decent time and both dishes were served together. Plenty of detail has been paid to the whole setup. Bespeckled crockery, premium steel knives, cleverly folded napkins, and a swanky interior dress the meal in a rather upmarket wrapper.

The steak is served in as simple a way as it gets. Steak meets plate. End of story. In a matching bowl there was a generous portion of truffled fries, smelling lovely even from half way across the table.

The pork cheeks, on the contrary, are quite the spectacle. There’s a bed of mashed potato with carrots, bell peppers, and roasted onions for colour and flavour. The slow-cooked cheeks are arranged neatly on top of this arrangement and a towering slice of crisped, cured, pork aims for the heavens.

I cut into the steak and it was apparent that the chef had aimed at rare but settled for medium. This meant that the fattier parts of the steak and those in immediate proximity with the rib were delicious, with melted fat imbuing the meat with a rich, buttery flavour.

The texture towards the centre of the steak had suffered though, and lost the tenderness that dry ageing imparts. The truffled fries were quite lovely, even if a higher oil temperature could give them a crisper, drier exterior.

I tasted my way around the pork cheeks, with the grilled veg and mashed potato going from good to great. The pork cheeks themselves were good, and a slow-cooked pork cheek is terribly hard to mess up, but the seasoning was overly enthusiastic so they’d lost the delicate flavour that makes the pig’s jowls such a prized, if overlooked, cut of meat.

We paid €50 for the meal. It is steep for your average lunch but we’d opted to move away from their inexpensive options and eat a hearty meal. Throughout the meal, there was one dish that spun around my head – their burger with foie gras, served in a brioche bun. It sounds like a beautifully indulgent take on the cornerstone of rapid dining and I chided myself for not picking it, favouring a steak instead. So next time I visit I’ll buy a steak and have it wrapped up for eventual introduction to my grill pan. While I’m there I’ll have that burger. And as incredible as it sounds, I’m now waiting eagerly for a bad day to have a good reason to do so.

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