The Barbican, the City’s own housing estate, is not the prettiest area to spend an evening, unless you live there. It now has a reasonable complement of good eating places and undoubtedly one of the best is the Wood Street Bar and Restaurant.

The Venue
Tucked away in a corner where Wood Street and Fore Street meet, at the bottom of a huge block of flats lies the Wood Street Bar and Restaurant, a literal oasis among what the locals like to call the Barbican Village. It offers plenty to quench your thirst and has a very good menu served in a pub-like atmosphere, although one hates to call it a gastropub because it’s rather more than that. It has various nooks and crannies and a basement room for parties that lend it an intimacy not normally found in a regular pub – but then it isn’t a pub, because it’s what it says above the door, a bar and restaurant.

The Atmosphere
Being a one-off rather than just a branch of a restaurant chain, it is able to be individual. It was opened by a group of friends with on the same wave length about what they enjoyed and they have made it work very well. Manager Olivia Edwards and Chef Neil Walker have got it just right. It’s comfortable, attractive and welcoming with helpful staff and you have the feeling that they do actually want you to be there.

The Food
Apart from the lunch and dinner menu, there is also a quick snack menu at £3.50 each, a Sunday brunch from 11am to 2.30pm and a Sunday roast menu (beef, lamb, organic chicken) with all the trimmings for £12.95. The pre-theatre menu is £15 for two courses and £17.50 for three. Ingredients are well-sourced, with game from the Denham Estate, meat from award-winning Rare Butchers, artisan breads from the Born & Bread bakery and sustainable fish from Daily Fish.

From the main menu, the aged fillet of beef with rocket, Parmesan and truffle oil is delicious combination with the meat being particularly fine, and the roast wood pigeon breast with chicory, cepes and bacon is almost revelatory – beautifully tender meat, with tasty bacon bits and mushrooms, but what really makes the dish is the baked chicory – a touch of magic.

Main courses prove just as exciting. A plain rib-eye steak with Bearnaise sauce, watercress salad and Dauphinoise potatoes could not be better and the veal burger with roast Portobello mushroom, bacon and manchego cheese looks a handsome plateful. However, the piece de resistance is the roast rump of lamb, sliced into small pinkish medallions which has a nicely firm texture and oodles of flavour. It’s served with Chanteray carrots and an individual shepherd’s pie of braised shoulder of lamb with carrots and peas and topped with a smooth layer of potato. This is a real and piping hot treat and for this imaginative touch the Wood Street gets its extra star.

For dessert it has to be sticky date and ginger sponge with toffee ice cream, with the lightest of light sponges that would win a prize at any WI meeting: simply superb. The orange and cardamom creme brulee with shortbread is also enjoyable but is hardly in the same league.

The Drink
Wine is available in either small (175ml) or larger (250ml) glasses. There are seven red and seven white wines sold by the glass (from £3.65) or the bottle (from £13.50). The more expensive wines in a good list are priced up to around £60 for white and £80 for red. The 2005 Cotes du Rhone (£19.90 for a bottle) makes for very pleasant drinking. Being a bar as well as a restaurant, the usual beers and spirits are also available.

The Last Word
You might not expect somewhere as good as the Wood Street to be in the Barbican but there it is and, if you can find it, you will not be disappointed. Five stars all round!

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