Impala, the latest restaurant from the Super 8 group, has earned a five-star review for its bold North African-inspired menu in an industrial Soho space. The restaurant, located at 13-14 Dean Street, offers a colossal and ambitious menu that resists easy categorisation, blending Egyptian, Tunisian, Moroccan, Turkish and Cypriot influences with French and Thai techniques.
Standout duck dish
The dry-aged, roasted duck, finished on a wood-fired grill and glossed with a fig-laced jus, is described as the highlight. Its lacquered skin is darkly seductive, with a rosy pink centre, and the aiguillette (duck tender) is particularly luscious. Chef Meedu Saad, who has Egyptian heritage, named the restaurant after the Chevrolet he rode as a child in Ismailia.
Menu highlights and techniques
The molokhia, a supremely tender beef beneath a myrtle-hued gloss, is a sophisticated transformation of the traditional soup. Other dishes include a sublime squid salad with vivid harissa, a velvety white bean dip layered with bottarga and herbaceous paste, and shefatalia — salt-forward pork and offal patties wrapped in caul fat, soy-brushed and soothed by cinnamon. The dessert is a majestic tart with a silky custard, date paste and pistachio dust.
Saad’s judicious control of heat and bitterness, honed during seven years at Kiln, gives Impala’s fare its distinctive flavour profile. The menu is best tackled with a group, though some dishes like monkfish wrapped in vine leaves lack confident complexity. A shiso leaf-wrapped crab kibbeh improved on an earlier langoustine iteration.
Vibe, drink and tip
The vibe is a big, dark, industrial room that feels at home in Soho. The drink list offers around 40 wines by the glass, French-focused and carefully sectioned. Time Out recommends going in a group, not missing the duck, trying as many breads as possible, and not skipping the tart.
