The Actress, East Dulwich
The Actress, a new pub just around the corner from me, used to be called The Uplands. It was a bit of a dive. I’d often walk past on Saturday lunchtimes and there would be 3 or 4 customers nursing pints around a solitary table. I went in, once. It was one of those pubs that had a brilliant location in its favour and nothing else.
Transformed, it is now part of a clan which includes Saarf East staples The Bishop in East Dulwich, The Florence in Herne Hill and the recently opened Victoria Inn in Peckham.
She’s quite the looker now, The Actress but the real sight for sore eyes is the pizza oven. The whole interior has been re-furbished, sure; new paint, new furniture, new bar yadda yadda yadda but like I said, there’s a pizza oven. A monstrous furnace. I’d received an invitation to come over and play with it and seriously, who doesn’t want to do that? Making pizza at home is fine and all but the conventional oven isn’t capable of reaching the temperatures required to cook it properly and I’m not about to come over all Steingarten and start ‘modifying’ it myself.
The evening was about experimenting and having fun. We would play around with different toppings, from classics already in-house to the ridiculous, brought in by us lot.
First onto the paddle was one of my favourites – a white pizza with potato slices. This version came pepped with oozy Stilton. Although I thought the slices of potato should be cut much thinner (on a mandolin) and overlapped, I was happy to see an often forgotten topping make an appearance. Carb on carb, it rocks.
We then had a go at pimping our own, with varying degrees of success. I’d been too disorganised to find an ingredient to bring along, so I shamelessly gate-crashed Lizzie’s samphire instead. We ended up with a decadent combination of crab, samphire, ricotta and chilli. Great flavours but sadly, not great pizza.
Straight from the horror box: haggis and potato. I’ve tried it so you don’t have to. See? See what I’ll do for you in the name of research? It was like eating an offaly shepherd’s pie – on a pizza. Just a bit of a laugh on our part though, and definitely not one for the menu, don’t worry.
Highlights for me were meaty; a chorizo pizza was topped with two types, one skinned and crumbled and the other sliced. It was fun and generous. People will always want a spicy meat pizza. Personally I always want one with anchovy, capers and olives.
We shoved every topping going in and out of that oven, including a comedy calzone: someone’s sweaty Star Bar wrapped in a pizza base, which melted into gooey, peanut-studded wrongness. It felt dirty. It was great.
The Actress opens on Monday, and I’m sure they’ll have their recipes well and truly down by then. There will be more than pizza, too. We made quick work of some lamb, scorched and sizzling from the ferocious heat of the wood oven, juices preserved within. Cider-braised spicy ribs provoked moans of pleasure; forcefully spiced with a strong apple flavour. The meat flopped off the bone in huge, sticky chunks.
The Actress is going to make an absolute killing in this location. It sits at the corner of Crystal Palace Road and North Cross Road, which anyone who lives in East Dulwich knows is permanently rammed with yummy mummies and annoyingly beautiful and well-off people. They are going to lap this place up. If it’s not rammed to the rafters in the next few weeks then I’ll eat another haggis pizza and film it so you can see me pay for my shoddy prediction. That is how confident I am.
The Actress
90 Crystal Palace Road
East Dulwich
London
SE22 9EY
Category: Bars/Pubs | Tags: pizza East Dulwich, pizza restaurant Dulwich, The Actress, The Actress East Dulwich, The Actress pub 9 comments »
September 17th, 2010 at 11:06 am
Kind of a shame that the haggis one didn’t work out
September 17th, 2010 at 9:16 pm
now we will have to do a taste test Actress vs Gowlett…
September 18th, 2010 at 10:04 pm
my brother just lives round the corner from you will you still dobed and
breakfast because we come down to london 2 to3 times a year could
please let me know thank you
September 19th, 2010 at 12:23 am
Tried a pizza topped with nettle leaves this past summer. Really worked. Samphire holds promise I reckon. Maybe with a different combination.
September 19th, 2010 at 10:32 am
Morning David,
not doing B&B until next year, but do have 18 rooms here http://www.capitalpubcompany.com/The-Victoria-Inn/get-here.aspx
10 min walk to easy dulwich….
September 20th, 2010 at 10:11 pm
Is there a website yet?
If not, is the Actress menu online anywhere?
September 21st, 2010 at 9:31 am
Hi Sue, website isn’t ready yet but Scott just sent over a menu, here it is.
garlic flat bread, with olive oil & smoked salt 3.50 V
flat bread, olive oil & smoked salt, 3 V
corn on the cob with parmesan, paprika & lime 4 V
trealy farm meat platter 9
british cheese board 6 V
spicy chorizo baked with ham & beans 5 /8
cider braised pork ribs 6 /9
aubergine roasted with chickpeas, mozzarella & parmesan 4.5 /8 V
whole sea bream, baked with lemon & herbs 12
roast rump of lamb and potato & onion bake 14
‘pizza’
buffalo mozzarella, tomato and fresh basil 7 V
collar of pork, buff mozza, tomato and garlic mushrooms 8
beetroot, ricotta, goat’s cheese, sweetcorn & pea shoots 8 V
chilli beef, roast vine tomatoes, white onion and lord of the 100’s 8
chorizo, buff mozza, roast peppers, tomato, fennel sausage & pecorino 9
rosemary potatoes, roast garlic and stilton 7 V
for available slices please see the chalk walls
salad
smoked chicken caesar with a poached egg 9
brocolli, cucumber, poppy seed & chilli 8 V
beetroot, goat’s cheese & spring onion salad 8 V
mixed salad 4/8 V
side all 3
warm potato salad with gherkins & capers
sweetcorn, tomato & coriander salad
sage roasted pumpkin
bobby beans
dessert
chocolate banana split pizza (folded) 4.5
ice creams 1.5 per scoop
October 8th, 2011 at 1:25 pm
Is your B&B open and running> I have family comig for xmas, are you open around xmas
October 8th, 2011 at 4:17 pm
There is no B & B at The Actress but The Victoria in SE15 does.