Portorais Hotel
Via Piraineto, 125
Palermo, 90044
Sicily
Italy
+39 091 8693481
www.hotelportorais.com
by Blake Pudding
We were somewhere around Corleone on the edge of the mountains when the Prosecco began to take hold. I had been commissioned by Oligarch magazine (incorporating Toff Monthly) to write an article on a classic car rally. Girls, Alfa Romeos and louche antics, the piece would practically write itself and I would get a free holiday. It was not to be. When the rally organisers found out about my intentions they threatened to run over my legs with a 1972 Cadillac Eldorado. I was skint and commissionless in Sicily so I patched a call through to Malcolm Eggs to ask whether he would take a special breakfast dispatch. He said yes and generously agreed to pay my expenses out of the LRB budget. I was back in the game but rapidly running out of words without having touched on what I had for breakfast.
We had eaten that morning at the Hotel Portorais. Everyone looked a little peaky after the night before though not as peaky as the hotel itself with its air of faded grandeur and thwarted ambition. The staff’s uniforms looked like something from an am dram production of HMS Pinafore. They laid on a top breakfast though. Excellent coffee of course - it is very hard to get bad coffee in Sicily - but also cakes, tarts, croissants, yoghurt and best of all a kind of flat calzone thing stuffed with ham and cheese. Not knowing when, where or with whom I would be having lunch, I made a bit of a pig of myself. I need not have worried, as after getting slightly lost, we ran into the rest of the group just outside Monreale. The Cadillac was groaning with food and wine. I necked the best part of a bottle of Prosecco, ate more pizza and then shouted “follow me to Corleone, I know the way,” though of course I didn’t and was just drunk and showing off.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Friday, May 08, 2009
Wild Cherry, Bethnal Green
Wild Cherry
241 Globe Rd
Bethnal Green
E2 0JD
020 8980 6678
www.wildcherrycafe.com
by Joyce Carol Oats
I am meant to be in Chicago this Bank Holiday weekend, eating spongey pancakes drowned in sticky brown syrup that tastes of twenty different E-numbers, accompanied by my nice ex-boyfriend and the faint hope that Ira Glass might turn up in the diner. But alas! A twist of fate has left me in Bethnal Green - usually my favourite place on the planet, but not when I'm meant to be in Chicago. To simulate the experience I crave, I decide to breakfast at Wild Cherry: they do a passable American-style pancake, albeit with a maple syrup that doesn't require quotation marks.
Wild Cherry is a not-for-profit operation, run by the London Buddhist Centre, which is next door. And maybe this is why the service is so appalling. The staff members get orders wrong, fail to bring food altogether, or sometimes just blink and smile beatifically. It's the kind of behaviour that would make me very short-tempered anywhere else, but here it makes me sigh affectionately and think, 'Oh, you guys' in a way not dissimilar to how I regard my untrainable but lovable border collie.
The breakfast menu - only served on Saturdays – has two things worth eating. There are pancakes with fruit, maple syrup and mascarpone (and variations thereof), or a vegetarian full English affair which includes by far the best scrambled eggs I've ever had the pleasure of interacting with: fluffy and not greasy and decorated with chopped fresh chives. I assume they are the product of zen hens. There is also some kind of muesli, but I have never seen anyone order it (what kind of person orders muesli in a restaurant?) and a choice of wraps that look less than delightful.
The garden outside is non-smoking, which pleases me, since I am an asthmatic square. When the pancakes arrive they are a little thinner than usual, like someone forgot to add the leavening agent because he was thinking about more spiritual things. But they are still whole wheat-y and delicious, topped what must be more than £6.25 worth of chopped seasonal fresh fruit alone, a generous blob of thick mascarpone, and a glistening pool of syrup that was once actually part of a tree. I am sad that the café upgraded its old drip coffee maker (free refills) to an espresso machine (non free refills, and tastes burnt). But munching my way through the pancakes and reading an interesting essay on Beckett in the New York Review of Books, I think: OK, no Ira Glass, or E-numbers, or ex-boyfriend. But almost.
241 Globe Rd
Bethnal Green
E2 0JD
020 8980 6678
www.wildcherrycafe.com
by Joyce Carol Oats
I am meant to be in Chicago this Bank Holiday weekend, eating spongey pancakes drowned in sticky brown syrup that tastes of twenty different E-numbers, accompanied by my nice ex-boyfriend and the faint hope that Ira Glass might turn up in the diner. But alas! A twist of fate has left me in Bethnal Green - usually my favourite place on the planet, but not when I'm meant to be in Chicago. To simulate the experience I crave, I decide to breakfast at Wild Cherry: they do a passable American-style pancake, albeit with a maple syrup that doesn't require quotation marks.
Wild Cherry is a not-for-profit operation, run by the London Buddhist Centre, which is next door. And maybe this is why the service is so appalling. The staff members get orders wrong, fail to bring food altogether, or sometimes just blink and smile beatifically. It's the kind of behaviour that would make me very short-tempered anywhere else, but here it makes me sigh affectionately and think, 'Oh, you guys' in a way not dissimilar to how I regard my untrainable but lovable border collie.
The breakfast menu - only served on Saturdays – has two things worth eating. There are pancakes with fruit, maple syrup and mascarpone (and variations thereof), or a vegetarian full English affair which includes by far the best scrambled eggs I've ever had the pleasure of interacting with: fluffy and not greasy and decorated with chopped fresh chives. I assume they are the product of zen hens. There is also some kind of muesli, but I have never seen anyone order it (what kind of person orders muesli in a restaurant?) and a choice of wraps that look less than delightful.
The garden outside is non-smoking, which pleases me, since I am an asthmatic square. When the pancakes arrive they are a little thinner than usual, like someone forgot to add the leavening agent because he was thinking about more spiritual things. But they are still whole wheat-y and delicious, topped what must be more than £6.25 worth of chopped seasonal fresh fruit alone, a generous blob of thick mascarpone, and a glistening pool of syrup that was once actually part of a tree. I am sad that the café upgraded its old drip coffee maker (free refills) to an espresso machine (non free refills, and tastes burnt). But munching my way through the pancakes and reading an interesting essay on Beckett in the New York Review of Books, I think: OK, no Ira Glass, or E-numbers, or ex-boyfriend. But almost.
Friday, May 01, 2009
Breakfasts and Beds: Escape, Llandudno
Escape Boutique B&B
48 Church Walks
Landudno
LL30 2HL
01492 877 776
www.escapebandb.co.uk
by Cher E. Jamm
I don't know about you, but when I go away to a bed & breakfast, I'm usually disproportionately excited about the prospect of breakfast the next morning. I don't care for soft furnishings, and I certainly don't give two hoots about where we dine on the day of arrival, but I'll drool and fantasise and lose sleep over the morning to come. And I'm usually disappointed and left fuming and tearful at the piddly excuse of what lay before my eyes.
At the Escape Boutique B&B, from the moment we swanned into the ornate dining room, with its parquet floors, high ceilings and fancy table settings, I got the feeling that past experiences could potentially wash away. Linen napkins and neat little menus greeted us, as did the extraordinarily gorgeous, smiling waitress who would not look out of place in a Californian beauty contest. I had to ask Mr Jamm to retrieve his jaw from the floor.
And with that, a flurry of ordering took place. Freshly squeezed grapefruit juice and a cafetiere of Columbia's finest arrived with a flourish. Deliciously fresh fruit salad with natural yoghurt served in classy tumblers were gobbled up within seconds. A glance at the Sunday papers and then it was then time for the Grand Poobah, the real test of metal. The Escape was about to show its true colours.
And what colours they were. Two neat, finely fried eggs lay in the middle of this handsome plate, surrounded by the holy hexagon of all that makes a Full English. Two sausages of rare and fine pedigree (and still sizzling!); crisp bacon that is a reminder to all of why we should only eat animals that have led happy lives; a grilled field mushroom that could have doubled as a parasol; a grilled tomato that was actually cooked (I can't recall the last time that happened); a few spoonfuls of beans that didn't swamp the plate and finally, the piece de resistance: black pudding as I never knew or liked before. It was about the shape and size of a cocktail sausage and perfectly cooked on the outside, and full of bloody, oatey goodness on the inside.
I implore you all to go. Go to Llandudno, that rusty and charming old seaside resort. Go stay at the Escape B&B with it's fine soft furnishings and lovely staff. Go and find salvation in a breakfast fit for gods. And then go tell all your friends to do the same.
48 Church Walks
Landudno
LL30 2HL
01492 877 776
www.escapebandb.co.uk
by Cher E. Jamm
I don't know about you, but when I go away to a bed & breakfast, I'm usually disproportionately excited about the prospect of breakfast the next morning. I don't care for soft furnishings, and I certainly don't give two hoots about where we dine on the day of arrival, but I'll drool and fantasise and lose sleep over the morning to come. And I'm usually disappointed and left fuming and tearful at the piddly excuse of what lay before my eyes.
At the Escape Boutique B&B, from the moment we swanned into the ornate dining room, with its parquet floors, high ceilings and fancy table settings, I got the feeling that past experiences could potentially wash away. Linen napkins and neat little menus greeted us, as did the extraordinarily gorgeous, smiling waitress who would not look out of place in a Californian beauty contest. I had to ask Mr Jamm to retrieve his jaw from the floor.
And with that, a flurry of ordering took place. Freshly squeezed grapefruit juice and a cafetiere of Columbia's finest arrived with a flourish. Deliciously fresh fruit salad with natural yoghurt served in classy tumblers were gobbled up within seconds. A glance at the Sunday papers and then it was then time for the Grand Poobah, the real test of metal. The Escape was about to show its true colours.
And what colours they were. Two neat, finely fried eggs lay in the middle of this handsome plate, surrounded by the holy hexagon of all that makes a Full English. Two sausages of rare and fine pedigree (and still sizzling!); crisp bacon that is a reminder to all of why we should only eat animals that have led happy lives; a grilled field mushroom that could have doubled as a parasol; a grilled tomato that was actually cooked (I can't recall the last time that happened); a few spoonfuls of beans that didn't swamp the plate and finally, the piece de resistance: black pudding as I never knew or liked before. It was about the shape and size of a cocktail sausage and perfectly cooked on the outside, and full of bloody, oatey goodness on the inside.
I implore you all to go. Go to Llandudno, that rusty and charming old seaside resort. Go stay at the Escape B&B with it's fine soft furnishings and lovely staff. Go and find salvation in a breakfast fit for gods. And then go tell all your friends to do the same.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Op-Egg: Advertisers, please just let bacon be bacon
by Hashley Brown
Walking to work the other morning I was assaulted by two wildly contrasting adverts for breakfast products. The first amazed me by how flawed it was; the other tantalized with its genius.
First off, for Weight Watchers bacon - "putting bacon back on the table" (or something) it screamed. I had to go back and check. It looked like a scene from ER, some sort of cauterized flesh, or healing scar tissue. This was bacon that had received a surgical procedure, precision engineered to remove every morsel of delicious flavourful fat. Probably with a laser. This isn't bacon in my book, it's bastardized pig flesh.
It troubled me deeply. If you shouldn't eat bacon because you're a bit chubby then hold off and eat it rarely, but eat good bacon, thick cut with all its flavour intact.
I couldn't shake this image until when rising up the escalator at Euston, like some pre-raphaelite vision of beauty a series of pictures flashed before me on one of those little TV advert things. "Saturday is breakfast day" it said as a flurry of close up, almost pornographic images flickered - an oozing poached egg, glistening almost weeping bacon - and then a big pack of Lurpak butter. This is more like it. Proper breakfasting should be sexy, indulgent and full of delicious fatty stuff, not some ascetic self-flaggelation. That's what muesli's for.
Walking to work the other morning I was assaulted by two wildly contrasting adverts for breakfast products. The first amazed me by how flawed it was; the other tantalized with its genius.
First off, for Weight Watchers bacon - "putting bacon back on the table" (or something) it screamed. I had to go back and check. It looked like a scene from ER, some sort of cauterized flesh, or healing scar tissue. This was bacon that had received a surgical procedure, precision engineered to remove every morsel of delicious flavourful fat. Probably with a laser. This isn't bacon in my book, it's bastardized pig flesh.
It troubled me deeply. If you shouldn't eat bacon because you're a bit chubby then hold off and eat it rarely, but eat good bacon, thick cut with all its flavour intact.
I couldn't shake this image until when rising up the escalator at Euston, like some pre-raphaelite vision of beauty a series of pictures flashed before me on one of those little TV advert things. "Saturday is breakfast day" it said as a flurry of close up, almost pornographic images flickered - an oozing poached egg, glistening almost weeping bacon - and then a big pack of Lurpak butter. This is more like it. Proper breakfasting should be sexy, indulgent and full of delicious fatty stuff, not some ascetic self-flaggelation. That's what muesli's for.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Paris Cafe & Sandwich Bar, Hoxton
Paris Cafe & Sandwich Bar
140 Hoxton Street
Hoxton
N1 6SH
020 7684 7407
by Paddy Hashbrown
What is Paris? Croissants on the banks of the Seine. A cafe noisette in Le Marais. Reposing in the Shakespeare bookshop near the Notre Dame. It can safely be said that enduring breakfast at "Paris Cafe" in Hoxton Street on a drizzly Sunday morning is not redolent of the dear French capital.
I am hoodwinked into visiting this emporium of grease 'n' mediocrity by a combination of a growling stomach, an out-of-bounds kitchen and sheer undiluted desperation for sustenance. I enter, relieved after trundling for twenty minutes round the grey roads of Hoxton. The smell of fried bacon entices and like Pavlov's dog I curl up at a window seat. I flirt with the idea of beans on toast, toy with the idea of a mushroom sandwich (despite a horrifying experience the week before at the Sheperdess on City Road) and salaciously eye up the Cafe Paris fry-up.
"Breakfast number 2" I mutter, eyes matted with sleep, stomach empty of last night's thimble of tomato soup.
I glance around at the clientele. A family nearby decked in noisy Le Coq Sportif apparel square up over the missing contents of The People. "Hooz got the sports sekshun? I don't want the telly guide. Where's the flippin' racing guide? Where's me flippin' breakfast? Oi! Waitress!"
I decide that I'd happily wait 30,000 years for my breakfast but to my horror it arrives within mere hours. I didn't order hash browns. I hate hash browns. What's going on? I didn't order sausage either, and certainly not three glistening cylinders of microwaved ersatz pig. Ah, rejoice, beans. If Britain was built on beans I can surely erect a tarpaulin of beans over the rest of my order. Where's my mug of tea gone? Ah yes, I drank it in one hours ago.
I leave a few minutes later, five pounds poorer and three mouthfuls fuller.
Never before in the history of greasy spoon documenting has so much food been wasted by so hungry a critic.
140 Hoxton Street
Hoxton
N1 6SH
020 7684 7407
by Paddy Hashbrown
What is Paris? Croissants on the banks of the Seine. A cafe noisette in Le Marais. Reposing in the Shakespeare bookshop near the Notre Dame. It can safely be said that enduring breakfast at "Paris Cafe" in Hoxton Street on a drizzly Sunday morning is not redolent of the dear French capital.
I am hoodwinked into visiting this emporium of grease 'n' mediocrity by a combination of a growling stomach, an out-of-bounds kitchen and sheer undiluted desperation for sustenance. I enter, relieved after trundling for twenty minutes round the grey roads of Hoxton. The smell of fried bacon entices and like Pavlov's dog I curl up at a window seat. I flirt with the idea of beans on toast, toy with the idea of a mushroom sandwich (despite a horrifying experience the week before at the Sheperdess on City Road) and salaciously eye up the Cafe Paris fry-up.
"Breakfast number 2" I mutter, eyes matted with sleep, stomach empty of last night's thimble of tomato soup.
I glance around at the clientele. A family nearby decked in noisy Le Coq Sportif apparel square up over the missing contents of The People. "Hooz got the sports sekshun? I don't want the telly guide. Where's the flippin' racing guide? Where's me flippin' breakfast? Oi! Waitress!"
I decide that I'd happily wait 30,000 years for my breakfast but to my horror it arrives within mere hours. I didn't order hash browns. I hate hash browns. What's going on? I didn't order sausage either, and certainly not three glistening cylinders of microwaved ersatz pig. Ah, rejoice, beans. If Britain was built on beans I can surely erect a tarpaulin of beans over the rest of my order. Where's my mug of tea gone? Ah yes, I drank it in one hours ago.
I leave a few minutes later, five pounds poorer and three mouthfuls fuller.
Never before in the history of greasy spoon documenting has so much food been wasted by so hungry a critic.
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
Blandford's, Marylebone
Blandford’s
65 Chiltern Street
Marylebone
W1U 6NH
020 7486 4117
by Shreddie Kruger
A trip to Blandford’s is not an undertaking one must, erm, undertake lightly. It requires days of planning and a clear schedule. A typical breakfast will take around 349 days to arrive. It’s the Guinness of the breakfast world – good things come to those who wait.
You must be prepared for the sort of surly service that makes you wonder how they stay in business. The guy in charge tends to wear faded jeans so tight you wonder whether he sprays them on in the morning. Or whether he put them on when he was 12, realised they were irremovable and was therefore doomed to wear them for the rest of his life. The look is topped off with an equally hugging, and no less fetching, white t-shirt. My hypothesis is that tightness of clothes is directly proportional to grumpiness.
As you order you get the feeling that he’s wondering whether he can be bothered to serve you. Maybe it’s all a bit too much effort. Or he doesn’t agree with your choices. It’s the sort of aloof charm that I love.
On a quiet weekday morning we were in the company of a very mixed crowd – two chaps in hi-vis vests pored over the financial column in the Daily Sport and a charming, bohemian girl was penning the finishing touches to her debut novel. Meanwhile we were admiring the tea coloured wallpaper and a faded mural from a Swedish naval battle that typifies the offbeat-retro-nostalgia this joint exudes.
Having had our request for a refill of tea dismissed, our breakfasts arrived. My “Blandford’s Special” consisted of an expertly fried egg, 2 rashers of sublime bacon that had been basted with extra grease (bravo), some oily mushrooms, some unwanted and wooly tomatoes and a disappointing sausage. I’ve only just twigged that it was the same components as Little Chef at Popham and had exactly the same flaws. The sausage was cheap and nasty, but without the Pot Noodle factor that would have redeemed its filthiness and the tomatoes were big and fluffy like car dice. It pains me to write this because normally everything is perfect. I wimped out and chose toast over fried bread, which, redeemingly, came cut at a jaunty angle.
Whilst my breakfast was uncharacteristically mixed, Ed’s scrambled eggs, bacon and beans could be held up to the rest of the class and an example for others to copy. Textbook stuff.
We emerged with the best part of a year taken off our lives, but full of beans to take on the rest of the day. Just remember, if you’re going to go to Blandford’s, make sure you’ve told your next of kin first. Otherwise, you’ll be gone so long they will send out a search party and report you to missing persons.
65 Chiltern Street
Marylebone
W1U 6NH
020 7486 4117
by Shreddie Kruger
A trip to Blandford’s is not an undertaking one must, erm, undertake lightly. It requires days of planning and a clear schedule. A typical breakfast will take around 349 days to arrive. It’s the Guinness of the breakfast world – good things come to those who wait.
You must be prepared for the sort of surly service that makes you wonder how they stay in business. The guy in charge tends to wear faded jeans so tight you wonder whether he sprays them on in the morning. Or whether he put them on when he was 12, realised they were irremovable and was therefore doomed to wear them for the rest of his life. The look is topped off with an equally hugging, and no less fetching, white t-shirt. My hypothesis is that tightness of clothes is directly proportional to grumpiness.
As you order you get the feeling that he’s wondering whether he can be bothered to serve you. Maybe it’s all a bit too much effort. Or he doesn’t agree with your choices. It’s the sort of aloof charm that I love.
On a quiet weekday morning we were in the company of a very mixed crowd – two chaps in hi-vis vests pored over the financial column in the Daily Sport and a charming, bohemian girl was penning the finishing touches to her debut novel. Meanwhile we were admiring the tea coloured wallpaper and a faded mural from a Swedish naval battle that typifies the offbeat-retro-nostalgia this joint exudes.
Having had our request for a refill of tea dismissed, our breakfasts arrived. My “Blandford’s Special” consisted of an expertly fried egg, 2 rashers of sublime bacon that had been basted with extra grease (bravo), some oily mushrooms, some unwanted and wooly tomatoes and a disappointing sausage. I’ve only just twigged that it was the same components as Little Chef at Popham and had exactly the same flaws. The sausage was cheap and nasty, but without the Pot Noodle factor that would have redeemed its filthiness and the tomatoes were big and fluffy like car dice. It pains me to write this because normally everything is perfect. I wimped out and chose toast over fried bread, which, redeemingly, came cut at a jaunty angle.
Whilst my breakfast was uncharacteristically mixed, Ed’s scrambled eggs, bacon and beans could be held up to the rest of the class and an example for others to copy. Textbook stuff.
We emerged with the best part of a year taken off our lives, but full of beans to take on the rest of the day. Just remember, if you’re going to go to Blandford’s, make sure you’ve told your next of kin first. Otherwise, you’ll be gone so long they will send out a search party and report you to missing persons.
Friday, April 03, 2009
Cafe SO, Tower 42, Broadgate
Cafe SO
Tower 42
25 Old Broad Street
London EC2N 1HQ
www.tower42.co.uk
by Bloody Mary
Today, I breakfasted where I work - a security threat called Tower 42. It is my favourite skyscraper in London, a scored metal behemoth shaped in the celtic bud of the Nat West symbol, with a proud glowing blue head. Tower 42 used to be the tallest building in London but whilst it now stoops limply beneath Canary Wharf, its style keeps it firmly entrenched in Londoners' affections. Eerily, floor 13 of the tower does not exist - or rather, it is physically there, but in permanent darkness. No lifts stop there and the fire escapes block it off. Rumours of CIA/MI5/FSB headquarters abound.
The new Cafe SO at the bottom of the Tower is a "deli cafe". A deli cafe is a US freemarket invention, minus any nod to US customer service. A purchase involves pointing and grunting at someone dressed in plastic who probably hates you, in order to make up "sandwiches" from filmy, multicoloured filling variations plus mayonnaise, a choice of iceberg or a tomato slice, served on any of a choice of breads (all of which seemed to be bagels). Pre-coffee, it’s an imposing assault course. I know how to point at things, as I am a brilliant shopper. However, I am a terrible cook. I don’t know how foods like to be combined. This is why I go to restaurants.
Big steel army vats of “fried breakfast” were a nice addition to the sparse sandwich “bar”. The sausages looked sizzlingly hot and everything was sparklingly clean. It is difficult to miscombine a fryup, but I only knew everything was clean because most of the vats seemed to be empty. This at 8.30, their busiest time.
Though the staff were friendlier than anticipated, it’s unavoidably claustrophobic to breakfast at the bottom of a skyscraper. The heaviness of the floors above you, suits around you and hours before you weigh on your choices. I panicked. I chose anything that looked pretty. I pointed at prawns, then at an inoffensive bagel, then at cheese. This didn't taste as good as I had hoped. Thankfully the coffee - hot, strong and foamy - washed away the taste.
Café SO is challenging. Some people like challenges, but I’m afraid I need more help with breakfast. I might have to leave the plotting to the spies on the thirteenth floor.
Tower 42
25 Old Broad Street
London EC2N 1HQ
www.tower42.co.uk
by Bloody Mary
Today, I breakfasted where I work - a security threat called Tower 42. It is my favourite skyscraper in London, a scored metal behemoth shaped in the celtic bud of the Nat West symbol, with a proud glowing blue head. Tower 42 used to be the tallest building in London but whilst it now stoops limply beneath Canary Wharf, its style keeps it firmly entrenched in Londoners' affections. Eerily, floor 13 of the tower does not exist - or rather, it is physically there, but in permanent darkness. No lifts stop there and the fire escapes block it off. Rumours of CIA/MI5/FSB headquarters abound.
The new Cafe SO at the bottom of the Tower is a "deli cafe". A deli cafe is a US freemarket invention, minus any nod to US customer service. A purchase involves pointing and grunting at someone dressed in plastic who probably hates you, in order to make up "sandwiches" from filmy, multicoloured filling variations plus mayonnaise, a choice of iceberg or a tomato slice, served on any of a choice of breads (all of which seemed to be bagels). Pre-coffee, it’s an imposing assault course. I know how to point at things, as I am a brilliant shopper. However, I am a terrible cook. I don’t know how foods like to be combined. This is why I go to restaurants.
Big steel army vats of “fried breakfast” were a nice addition to the sparse sandwich “bar”. The sausages looked sizzlingly hot and everything was sparklingly clean. It is difficult to miscombine a fryup, but I only knew everything was clean because most of the vats seemed to be empty. This at 8.30, their busiest time.
Though the staff were friendlier than anticipated, it’s unavoidably claustrophobic to breakfast at the bottom of a skyscraper. The heaviness of the floors above you, suits around you and hours before you weigh on your choices. I panicked. I chose anything that looked pretty. I pointed at prawns, then at an inoffensive bagel, then at cheese. This didn't taste as good as I had hoped. Thankfully the coffee - hot, strong and foamy - washed away the taste.
Café SO is challenging. Some people like challenges, but I’m afraid I need more help with breakfast. I might have to leave the plotting to the spies on the thirteenth floor.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Fortess Cafe Restaurant, Tufnell Park
Fortess Cafe Restaurant
122 Fortess Road
Tufnell Park
NW5 2HL
[Street view]
by Nelson Griddle
Greasy spoons, in my experience, come in two varieties: there are Harolds and there are Alberts.
These two categories derive, of course, from the two Steptoes of the TV sitcom. Harold, the son, is undoubtedly on the rough and ready side, but possesses a certain debonair charm, a puppyish enthusiasm. Greasy spoons of the Harold variety try to make you feel comfortable. They have aspirations - like serving cappuccinos or sandwiches made on ciabatta.
Alberts, meanwhile, are determined to stay as they are, however grim and impoverished that might be. Echoing some innate stubbornness in the British character, they almost seem to revel in their status at the bottom of the pile.
Such cafes are the gathering places of the dispossessed and unhinged of the earth. The semi-legendary Rock Steady Eddie’s in Camberwell is a good example - containing on an average morning more loonies than a scene of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Alberts nurse the misfortunes of their customers. They offer no consolation but the consolation of despair. In short, they are depressing, and often not terribly clean.
Fortess is one of the London’s Alberts. The food is average greasy-spoon fare. Nothing about the set breakfast I order is particularly bad (or good). But what marks the place out as an Albert is the unmistakable atmosphere. Despite walls painted heavy red and actually quite friendly service, there’s something comfortless and vaguely Soviet about the place. You feel as though you could be in hospital or prison.
Maybe it’s the insufficient lighting, which makes the main eating area feel gloomy and cavernous. Or perhaps it’s the long, cold, peeling corridor that leads to the none-too-clean toilet. Then again, it could be the condensation, which mists the plate-glass frontage of the café and trickles down endlessly, seeming to whisper to each and every passerby: “I am an Albert... All hope abandon, ye who enter here.”
122 Fortess Road
Tufnell Park
NW5 2HL
[Street view]
by Nelson Griddle
Greasy spoons, in my experience, come in two varieties: there are Harolds and there are Alberts.
These two categories derive, of course, from the two Steptoes of the TV sitcom. Harold, the son, is undoubtedly on the rough and ready side, but possesses a certain debonair charm, a puppyish enthusiasm. Greasy spoons of the Harold variety try to make you feel comfortable. They have aspirations - like serving cappuccinos or sandwiches made on ciabatta.
Alberts, meanwhile, are determined to stay as they are, however grim and impoverished that might be. Echoing some innate stubbornness in the British character, they almost seem to revel in their status at the bottom of the pile.
Such cafes are the gathering places of the dispossessed and unhinged of the earth. The semi-legendary Rock Steady Eddie’s in Camberwell is a good example - containing on an average morning more loonies than a scene of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Alberts nurse the misfortunes of their customers. They offer no consolation but the consolation of despair. In short, they are depressing, and often not terribly clean.
Fortess is one of the London’s Alberts. The food is average greasy-spoon fare. Nothing about the set breakfast I order is particularly bad (or good). But what marks the place out as an Albert is the unmistakable atmosphere. Despite walls painted heavy red and actually quite friendly service, there’s something comfortless and vaguely Soviet about the place. You feel as though you could be in hospital or prison.
Maybe it’s the insufficient lighting, which makes the main eating area feel gloomy and cavernous. Or perhaps it’s the long, cold, peeling corridor that leads to the none-too-clean toilet. Then again, it could be the condensation, which mists the plate-glass frontage of the café and trickles down endlessly, seeming to whisper to each and every passerby: “I am an Albert... All hope abandon, ye who enter here.”
Friday, March 27, 2009
Pastis, New York
Pastis
9 9th Ave
New York, NY 10014
USA
+1 212-929-4844
by Emma Ricano
Three months trawling LA casting circuit (see Dottie's True Blue Cafe) and no work to show for it. Agent says economy is hindering chances for young actresses but that I should update my Michael Bolton haircut first. No dice, I say, has taken me ages to foster that look. Occurs to me that maybe I was put on God’s Green Earth to procreate rather than earn a dime; read in Grazia that Angelina Jolie is looking for pad in NYC's Meatpacking District so I head over to the East Coast to mine her for information on How to Create the Perfect Family, Step 1.
Collar an undernourished Manhattanite dressed in hip acid colours and beg to be told where people like Angie and the SATC girls hang. He points me in the direction of Pastis, whose plain yet stylish exterior plus cobbles are matchy-matchy with Grazia article. Bingo.
Staff friendly and helpful, particularly when seating me in far corner after I decline their offer to stow my high-vis jerkin and hat. Notice that clientele are all dressed in slim black cigarette pants and worry that Angie might not be let in wearing pregnancy kaftan.
Drink huge bowl of excellent, strong milky coffee to remain alert for her arrival. Disregard light dishes clearly designed for celebs e.g. omelette aux fines herbes and head straight for a carbo rocket: brioche French toast with maple syrup. Knock back a freshly squeezed orange juice (essential to dose up on the vitamins necessary to prepare body for birth and/or adoption) then remove high vis gloves to applaud arrival of breakfast plate, a gravy boat of colourful seasonal fruits and two pieces of brioche so large and angular I worry how anyone without a gob the size of a truck will manage. Feel sure Angie would help me out if she were here but in her absence I carve off hefty chunks of what turns out to be light and eggy heaven dosed liberally with maple syrup and powdered sugar. The accompanying fresh fruits take the edge off the sweetness and I relax back to enjoy food high.
Half an hour later I come crashing down and start searching menu desperately for further fix, like side of bacon, pastry or house specialty, tartine. In the end I plump for a glass of champagne which emboldens me for some crucial groundwork ahead; must attract mate if I am to procreate so suggestively wink at likely looking gents. Ten minutes later kindly waiter approaches with eye drops and the bill. Engage him in conversation over excellent quality of breakfast and discover he is big fan of Michael Bolton.
9 9th Ave
New York, NY 10014
USA
+1 212-929-4844
by Emma Ricano
Three months trawling LA casting circuit (see Dottie's True Blue Cafe) and no work to show for it. Agent says economy is hindering chances for young actresses but that I should update my Michael Bolton haircut first. No dice, I say, has taken me ages to foster that look. Occurs to me that maybe I was put on God’s Green Earth to procreate rather than earn a dime; read in Grazia that Angelina Jolie is looking for pad in NYC's Meatpacking District so I head over to the East Coast to mine her for information on How to Create the Perfect Family, Step 1.
Collar an undernourished Manhattanite dressed in hip acid colours and beg to be told where people like Angie and the SATC girls hang. He points me in the direction of Pastis, whose plain yet stylish exterior plus cobbles are matchy-matchy with Grazia article. Bingo.
Staff friendly and helpful, particularly when seating me in far corner after I decline their offer to stow my high-vis jerkin and hat. Notice that clientele are all dressed in slim black cigarette pants and worry that Angie might not be let in wearing pregnancy kaftan.
Drink huge bowl of excellent, strong milky coffee to remain alert for her arrival. Disregard light dishes clearly designed for celebs e.g. omelette aux fines herbes and head straight for a carbo rocket: brioche French toast with maple syrup. Knock back a freshly squeezed orange juice (essential to dose up on the vitamins necessary to prepare body for birth and/or adoption) then remove high vis gloves to applaud arrival of breakfast plate, a gravy boat of colourful seasonal fruits and two pieces of brioche so large and angular I worry how anyone without a gob the size of a truck will manage. Feel sure Angie would help me out if she were here but in her absence I carve off hefty chunks of what turns out to be light and eggy heaven dosed liberally with maple syrup and powdered sugar. The accompanying fresh fruits take the edge off the sweetness and I relax back to enjoy food high.
Half an hour later I come crashing down and start searching menu desperately for further fix, like side of bacon, pastry or house specialty, tartine. In the end I plump for a glass of champagne which emboldens me for some crucial groundwork ahead; must attract mate if I am to procreate so suggestively wink at likely looking gents. Ten minutes later kindly waiter approaches with eye drops and the bill. Engage him in conversation over excellent quality of breakfast and discover he is big fan of Michael Bolton.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
The Brill Restaurant and Cellar Bar, King's Cross
The Brill Restaurant and Cellar Bar
Omega Place
6-8 Caledonian Road
King's Cross
N1 9DT
by Salmon de Beauvoir
On my left there’s the psychotically painted façade of Tony’s Hemp Corner. On my right, the boarded-up windows and doors of The Flying Scotsman: strip-pub. This is the unlikely location of The Brill, a sophisticated-looking British eatery on Cally road, close to King’s Cross.
Everything’s beige and demure – and clean, which is ultimately why I go in (they also boast a dedicated breakfast/brunch menu). As the nervously smiling eastern European waitress shows me to a table (quelle elegance!), I approvingly note the artwork: watercolours of fish on plates. It’s not worth writing home about in any way, but it nicely counteracts the rather stiff atmosphere. Everywhere, couples sit quietly and obediently and wait for their food, which, let me tell you, is quite a wait. My companion comments that this bodes well, that a full English should take time to prepare.
Just as I start contemplating the disparity between this place’s deçor and its low prices (£4.50 for salmon and scrambled, £5.50 for full English) the food arrives. Aha! The Brill have aped the formula of the nearby St Pancras Champagne Bar: tiny bits of chopped-up smoked salmon nearly disappearing in a nightmare of overcooked scrambled eggs. Nothing stays together on my plate and the low price is suddenly explained. My companion's full English is “reasonable” – for the price, and for what you ordinarily get in London, but I feel like I was led to believe there’d be at least ‘Taste the Difference’-standard sausages, or slices of dense, “it’s-my-Polish-gran’s-recipe” bread. The absence of the advertised fried bread only makes matters worse. I wish I could tell you that their chrome espresso machine delivers something to savour, but alas, the cappuccino is some kind of mini Lait Russe.
It seems as if the owners spent all their money on the bohemian yellowy glass jars containing candles so could only afford to offer an uninteresting breakfast. I feel quite let down. From the waitress’ smile, the watermarked menu paper and the splendid name, I’d simply expected more. The old proverb has been proved right yet again; don’t judge a brekkie joint by the decorative mini trees flanking its entrance.
Oh, and they didn’t have any pastries... Scandal.
Omega Place
6-8 Caledonian Road
King's Cross
N1 9DT
by Salmon de Beauvoir
On my left there’s the psychotically painted façade of Tony’s Hemp Corner. On my right, the boarded-up windows and doors of The Flying Scotsman: strip-pub. This is the unlikely location of The Brill, a sophisticated-looking British eatery on Cally road, close to King’s Cross.
Everything’s beige and demure – and clean, which is ultimately why I go in (they also boast a dedicated breakfast/brunch menu). As the nervously smiling eastern European waitress shows me to a table (quelle elegance!), I approvingly note the artwork: watercolours of fish on plates. It’s not worth writing home about in any way, but it nicely counteracts the rather stiff atmosphere. Everywhere, couples sit quietly and obediently and wait for their food, which, let me tell you, is quite a wait. My companion comments that this bodes well, that a full English should take time to prepare.
Just as I start contemplating the disparity between this place’s deçor and its low prices (£4.50 for salmon and scrambled, £5.50 for full English) the food arrives. Aha! The Brill have aped the formula of the nearby St Pancras Champagne Bar: tiny bits of chopped-up smoked salmon nearly disappearing in a nightmare of overcooked scrambled eggs. Nothing stays together on my plate and the low price is suddenly explained. My companion's full English is “reasonable” – for the price, and for what you ordinarily get in London, but I feel like I was led to believe there’d be at least ‘Taste the Difference’-standard sausages, or slices of dense, “it’s-my-Polish-gran’s-recipe” bread. The absence of the advertised fried bread only makes matters worse. I wish I could tell you that their chrome espresso machine delivers something to savour, but alas, the cappuccino is some kind of mini Lait Russe.
It seems as if the owners spent all their money on the bohemian yellowy glass jars containing candles so could only afford to offer an uninteresting breakfast. I feel quite let down. From the waitress’ smile, the watermarked menu paper and the splendid name, I’d simply expected more. The old proverb has been proved right yet again; don’t judge a brekkie joint by the decorative mini trees flanking its entrance.
Oh, and they didn’t have any pastries... Scandal.
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