Wilson's, 77 Ladywell Rd, London SE13 7JA

Wilson's, London: It may not offer magic water, but Ladywell's latest opening could soon be worth a pilgrimage

With its cadre of independent shops ranging from a café apparently sponsored by Illy, to a ‘whole food pantry’ that role plays village life at inner city prices, Ladywell High Street would appear to be a recent notch on gentrification’s bedpost. Carbon-date that notch however and you’ll find that it’s hundreds of years old because historically, Ladywell has always had a knack for getting the punters in.

Named after a spring thought to have medicinal properties, Our Lady’s Well had been a pitstop of celestial refreshment for pilgrims on their way to Canterbury since the 15th century. At a time when we were more or less still dying of our teeth and worrying about falling off the edge of the horizon, a sip of magic wasn’t to be sniffed at.

Then in true Developer style, the Victorians decided that sites of antiquity cherished by local communities were for losers and so paved the whole thing over with a railway, lending to the Hornby Railway charm we see today. Now, Alina & Joel Falconer, founders of Oscar's on Ladywell High Street have opened the long-anticipated Wilson’s just opposite.

I’m particularly intrigued because the kitchen is in the palm of Henry Freestone whose sure-limbed, anti-pander cooking I first experienced nearly three years ago atPeckham Cellars. He'd been at both Tila & Bambi in that time of course, but I'd completely failed to get my ducks in a row. I've no excuses, just shame.

A lanky room divided into two pockets, Wilson’s babbles with chatter, giggles, decantations and clinks. A fully booked night, chilly, hopeful faces thaw into disappointment as they’re told the bad news at the door. If it's any consolation to those people, I almost choked on my bread while cackling.

Thanks, Ed. Thed.

“The bread is from Ed Baker. That’s not his last name” we’re told with a Last of the Midsummer Wine peculiarity. “I can never wait to get a slice every morning when he comes in and they’re still warm,” our waiter tells us, solemnly. Our slices come ever so lightly toasted which tends to trigger a klaxon but despite this, are yielding and mallowy beneath, with a Maldon-encrusted doubloon of butter.

Paging Julia Donaldson

Beef shin croquettes resemble a herd of Gruffalo’s put through a breaker’s yard compactor. They’re love-languagely generous, stuck into place with horseradish cream and just a touch of salt short of being reordered in triplicate. Slicked in a thick Dijon vinaigrette, the radicchio salad mimics the bittersweetness of marmalade, all brought into check with chunks of smoked mackerel. I'd be lying if I said I hadn't tried to fashion a chopped sarnie from this.

Marm’s the word

No stake required

A brace of anti-vampiric Toulouse sausages made to Henry’s specs by the local butcher Meat Jon up the road and utterly capitulating puy lentils, make up the solitary main. “It’s all simmered in chicken stock, that’s it,” said in a way that oozes disbelief in how others still don’t.

The ‘crispy potatoes’ are amber fragments, the scraps of the roastie world. It comes with an apple, rosemary and tomato ketchup that captures the fleeting line between caramelised and fresh – charging it with a sourness that warms into softness. I can only imagine this is howMichel Lotitomust’ve felt eating windows.

Like eating glass – and I mean that in the best possible way

Henry stands with his hands tucked into the sides of his apron, rocking back and forth on his heels and beaming, like a jolly Copper. “There’s no cocoa powder in the brownie; just good chocolate. And alotof it” wearing a mischievous schoolboy grin, as if he’d just pulled the fire alarm.

This thing has the dimensions ofZack Morris’ phone, minus the obscene antennae. Ever a point of personal preference, it lacks the almost wincingly-bitter cocoa hit I look for, but texturally it’s a lithosphere through to pure tandsmør. A fat quiff of whipped cream pins the salt flakes in place, which is exactly how I do it in the privacy of my own home. Clocks off the wall. Blinds drawn.

I’m Screech

Houston we have zero problems

Lastly is a rhubarb spritz; the cordial being something Henry knocked up when he had a spare second. With star anise, orange peel and other spices along with a bit of beetroot to deepen the colour, it’s got a near-jammy quality resembling bleary, Rover-like Mars footage.

Synonymous with overpromising and criminally underdelivering, the racketeering of small plates and wine has become a common expression of gentrification. But much like the railway, it’s also a facet of progress – whether we like it or not. When Our Lady’s Well was discovered, people probably still kicked off in the name of the old ways; demanding to know what was wrong with just chanting at a tree or reading entrails. Before you knew it, people were slagging off trains as an affront to cardio.

But Wilson's hums with a sense of grateful relief that it’s in a new era, reminiscent of Brockley’sGood As Gold; as if locals have been waiting to pour their affections into a vessel of precisely its dimensions. It’s just Henry and the KP in tonight, which might go some way to explaining the Billy No Mates main and why Henry’s also moonlighting as a waiter.

Despite this, there’s no sign of strain or fluster, from which an open kitchen affords very little cover and the fact that this amazes me, largely speaks to how much of a liability I’ve been in similar circumstances. By performing this smoothly on a skeleton crew while still in the throes of opening, Wilson’s has inadvertently made the best case for their potential. Motivated by fascination and greed, a return booking feels obligatory and, now we’re no longer dying of our teeth, what better way to celebrate than with beef shin croquettes and wodges of brownie?