Caffeine and Co, Manchester

I'd heard nothing but praise for Caffeine and Co, so I was looking forward to stopping in for a coffee and sandwich. A flying visit to Manchester the week before last gave me the opportunity.

Service was chatty and efficient, but a flat white and a sandwich were just slightly off-kilter on this visit. The coffee itself was an excellent blend, toasty and fruity all at once. The execution wasn't quite there though, the milk being just a little thin.

The reuben sandwich, despite not being a reuben, would have been a perfectly serviceable lunch option (generously filled, decent quality beef) had it not been toasted to buggery in the sandwich press. I've probably got myself to blame for that though, my default response to the question 'do you want it toasted?' being yes, when some sarnies are clearly better left alone.

Gripes aside I'm sure this is a quality place, and if I'd turned up on another day everything could have been perfect. The coffee is definitely worth a second glance and the cakes and other sandwiches all looked good. £2.40 for the flat white and £3.50 for the sandwich.

7/10

11 St James Square
Manchester
M2 6WH

https://www.facebook.com/caffeineandco/info

A summer round-up

I've been too lazy/busy (delete as appropriate) over this summer to blog about everything liked I used to. This is probably a good thing in many respects, fewer boring posts about nothing much of interest being the outcome, although it does mean that I've tended to focus only on the positive, lacking the enthusiasm to write about the mediocre or downright bad experiences.

To redress the balance a bit, here's a round up of some recent eating and drinking. Some of it good, most of it not very. A theme if there is one: why put something on the menu if you don't know what it is or can't be bothered making it properly.

Stay tuned for the next thrilling instalment, in which I dine at Noma, go on a pintxo crawl around the backstreets of assorted small Basque towns, cook barbecue in Kentucky, hang out in Dalston's latest dens of vice/burgers, and buy a sausage roll from Gregg's in Stockport on the way home. Only some of this is true.

Baked, Derby

A bakery with café in Derby city centre. The bread is certainly worth another look....

..but the coffee was just ok. The flat white wasn't a flat white.

Soup, half a sandwich and slaw for about six quid. Half a sandwich isn't an unreasonable idea, but it seems a bit stingy to stick to it rigidly when it's cut from a very small loaf. a lovely nutty wholemeal loaf by the way, but nothing to write home about otherwise.

6/10

http://www.baked-derby.com/


The Swan, West Malling, Kent

Hi friends from work, this one's for you! The Swan was the dinner venue for our team meeting at the end of June. As with the previous dinner back in April we chose from the early bird set menu, but unlike on that occasion it was evident throughout that we'd gone for the budget option.

An asparagus starter was notable only for having hardly any asparagus in it. Three spears or thereabouts. Of the mains neither cooked to grey burgers nor a dry pork dish impressed much.

And Eton Mess for pudding was fine but had blueberries in it. Why put the only non-native berry in a dish that's supposed to show off the best of the English summer?

On a more positive note they have Curious Brew lager on draft, which is a wonderful beer. Beautifully clean, crisp and balanced. A glance at the website suggests the people in charge of the Swan and the people brewing Curious are one and the same; their core business being the Chapel Down Winery that arguably produces Britain's finest wines.

Maybe we were just unlucky at the Swan, the undoubted booze pedigree of the business might suggest they know a thing or two about food as well.

5/10

http://www.loveswan.co.uk/westmalling/bar/index.html


Smythson's Deli, Nottingham

A load of old rubbish.

The espresso in the coffee was good, potent yet smooth. Shame the milk was a mess. And it wasn't a flat white either (it was supposed to be, I'm not laying into a latte for not being a flat white).

A poor excuse for a sandwich. One word sums it up: meagre. I can't be arsed elaborating.

3/10

https://www.facebook.com/smythsons


Queen's Park Gelateria and Café, Chesterfield

This place is run by Frederick's, the dominant force in the ice cream world around these parts. Their vans are all over the place, which is no bad thing as their ice cream is good stuff.

They run the park caff in Chesterfield, which is also no bad thing. Instead of the tea and cakes set up you might expect in a park it's more of a pizza and ice cream and beer arrangement.

Pizza and ice cream and beer in the park? Don't mind if I do. A shared ham, pepperoni and mushroom (good chewy crust, surprisingly good pepperoni) and a double scoop pistachio sugar cone makes a very fine lunch. Pizzas 6-7 quid, ice creams 2-3.

7/10

http://www.fredericksicecreams.co.uk/page/queens-park-cafe-and-gelataria/


Harvest Moon Espresso Bar, Chester

A coffee that meets its description! About bloody time.

The flat white here was properly made and properly proportioned, so I'll excuse them serving it in a glass (maybe they've been to Manchester, they do that there).

I'm not really sure what to say about the food though. I can't work out what they were thinking. A not really a Reuben sandwich was still quite nice in spite of not really being a Reuben. The bread was top notch and it was as stacked as you could reasonably expect for the modest price tag.

Why smearing the inside of very good bread with cheap sunflower spread seemed like a good plan is beyond me, and why serving it with stale tortilla chips and a completely undressed salad of lollo rosso, bits of cucumber and carrot and some damp cous cous seemed like a good plan is even further beyond me.

6/10

https://www.facebook.com/HarvestMoonEspressoBar

Cool River Cafe, Matlock

A recent opening in Matlock, could this be the local coffee shop of my dreams?

In a word, no. A moist, walnut-packed wodge of carrot cake with a pleasingly cheesy icing was spot on, but the coffee was crap, the advertised flat white turning out to be an oversized bucket of weak latte. 

They're still finding their feet so I'll give this one another try. The savouries looked on a par with the cakes, but the coffee needs some serious work.

6/10 (8 for the cake, 4 for the coffee)

http://coolrivercafe.co.uk/

Kerb and Caravan, King's Cross, London

I'm still here. Just. A trip to Somerset, a hell of a lot of tennis (watching not playing) and the sudden onset of a proper summer have all conspired to make my blogging even more sporadic than it was already. Lolling around in the sun and watching Murray win Wimbledon has taken precedence over waffling on about what I've been eating. With good reason I hope you'll agree.

So, now that the ghost of Fred has finally been laid to rest, back to business as usual.

A flying visit to Kent for work the week before last meant a change of trains at St Pancras. A few years ago you'd need a good couple of hours spare to make venturing from the northbound stations worthwhile, but the King's Cross area has come on in leaps and bounds in recent times, and boasts a whole host of options from sherry bars to street food, all within a few minutes walk of the station platforms.

It was the latter option that tempted, the street food collective formerly known as eat.st has expanded and relaunched as Kerb. They now have a whole host of stalls on daily rotation on the new pedestrian street round the back of King's Cross.

Kimchi Cult, purveyors of Korean style burgers, was the one I'd been looking forward to most. I bloody love Kimchi and was intrigued to see how its cabbagey funk worked outside its usual environment. I'm pleased to say it works very well. The spice and savour of the stuff works a treat with a high quality beef patty and plasticky cheese, in the same way that anything else pickled works with a burger or sausage.

It was all beautifully put together; bun the right texture, the right sort of melty cheese, very good meat in the patty, but the whole just didn't do that much for me. The presence of kimchi just made me crave a great bowlful of it in a porky noodle soup.

I can't blame Kimchi Cult for this, I think the realisation is finally dawning that I don't really care about burgers. The relentless obsession with the things in the food world in recent years has brainwashed me into seeking the burgery holy grail, but I don't think it exists. They're just not that exciting. Give me a fine steak or a Thai salad or a bowl of raspberries or a pork pie instead please.

£6 for the kimchi cheeseburger. Personal preferences aside this was a top notch burger, but six quid still seems to be pushing it a bit. I had plenty of room for lunch number two ten minutes later...

..which came courtesy of Yum Bun. I was hoping for a pork bun, but I'd left it too late so had to settle for the Japanese fried chicken bun. Garnished with iceberg lettuce, tartare sauce and chilli dressing this was a bit bloody lovely. The soft bun was a delight, just a little bit chewy but light and airy with it. The chicken: think KFC popcorn chicken with better meat, better batter and better frying skills. Very good.

£3.50 for one of these, or £6 for two. As with the burger, a bit overpriced I'd argue. I do think that the food served at all of these stalls is very good, and deserves comparison with similar restaurant offerings (I'm sure it's better in many cases) but lunch can be had at many restaurants for not much more money, and with the considerably larger overheads of a building, waiting staff and so forth. Minor gripe over, and ultimately the prices are pitched at what the London market will bear.

Between my burger and bun I grabbed a takeaway coffee from Caravan. I really want to eat at this place, the menu reads like a dream, but there wasn't time on this occasion so a coffee had to suffice. A £2.40 flat white (very fairly priced for the location) was good, but not as good as I'd been led to believe the coffee here would be. The coffee itself was excellent, the execution just slightly off though, the texture of the milk a little thin and not as smooth as it could have been.


Kimchi Cult 7/10
Yum Bun 8/10
Caravan coffee 7/10

Bold Street Coffee, Liverpool

Of all the coffee shops in northern cities I've been working my way around, Bold Street Coffee might just be the best yet.

The flat white was faultless. Beautifully crafted, perfectly textured, the espresso blend packing a punch but with a subtle fruitiness and hints of smoke too. A joy to drink.

A Monterey Jack, cheddar and onion toastie was also on the money. Generously proportioned and oozing loads of molten cheesy goodness, the sweet, sauteed onions were a nice touch, improving on a classic combination by avoiding the overpowering raw onion reek. The only thing I'd change would be to swap out the Monterey Jack for something with a bit more character, it melts well but doesn't taste of much.

£2.60 for the coffee, a little bit more expensive than the other independents I like, but still passes the 'cheaper than a shit version from a chain test' easily, and £2.95 for the huge sandwich seemed like a bargain. Also worth pointing out that the service was lovely, no hipster aloofness here.

Highly recommended. I'll be returning.

9/10

89 Bold Street
Liverpool
L1 4HF

http://www.boldstreetcoffee.co.uk/

Coffee outside the core

Just remembered I have a blog. Once upon a time I used to update it several times a week, with [exciting and informative] [rambling and tedious] (*delete as applicable) reviews of all manner of drinking and dining establishments across the north.

That's gone slightly awry for two reasons; firstly I haven't been eating out much, and secondly I've just moved to Derbyshire, which in case you hadn't noticed isn't in the north. So my blog is now both inappropriately named and lacking in subject material, which isn't a great recipe for success.

The upshot is that I did consider retiring it, but only for about ten minutes. Who cares if it's increasingly off-topic, I like writing it. Onwards and upwards then (or at least sideways, hopefully), to the subject of coffee outside the larger cities.

I know I can get coffee that I really bloody love in Sheffield, Leeds, Manchester and anywhere else you'd realistically term one of our major cities (London, Bristol, Glasgow etc). Beyond those? It seems to me to be more of a struggle. I can usually find somewhere good but not great.

Good is still a far better prospect than the chains though, whose general awfulness I was reminded of on my motorway travels this last week (boobie prize for utter shite goes to a Starbuck's flat white: burnt coffee, cheesy milk, wrong texture, almost three quid).

Here are two of the better places I've found. Both are good, neither are great. Suggestions welcome for great coffee away from the city?

Coffee Evolution, Huddersfield

A single shot cappuccino was a pleasingly small size and made with a dark, strong espresso blend. Bitter but not burnt. No flat whites on offer.

Coffee cake had properly buttery icing but was a bit dry. Good value at less than two quid for the coffee and around two quid for the cake.

7/10

9a Church Street
Huddersfield
HD1 1DD

http://www.coffeevolution.co.uk/

Peli Deli, Matlock

The sign above this place proclaims 'amazing coffee' which sadly isn't true. It's well-made, pleasant coffee but a couple of notches below amazing.

The flat white started with a good, velvety texture but reverted into latte territory before the too large cup was finished. Flavour-wise there's a hint of fruitiness, but it's too gentle and needs more oomph.

A mini Victoria sponge was a great little cake; moist sponge, fruit-packed jam and a generous wodge of buttercream. £2.40 for the coffee, £2 for the bun. Just realised I wrote about this place back in January, this time round it was better.

7/10

Crown Square
Matlock
DE4 3AT

http://www.pelideli.com

Six Eight Kafé, Birmingham

Just a quick heads up about a great coffee shop in Birmingham. I seem to end up in Brum every few months or so to attend some seminar or meeting or other, which usually means arrival in the New Street dungeon, not enough time to find anywhere decent, then a day of mediocre caffeinated liquids to keep me awake 'til the train home.

I know there's good coffee to be had in Birmingham, but up until now it's never been right there when I need it. Six Eight Kafé changed all that last week, conveniently appearing in front of me mere yards before I reached my destination.

The now customary flat white was a bobby-dazzler. Beautifully smooth in texture, just the right size, and made with an assertive, dark and roasty espresso blend that really hit the spot. The sandwiches looked good too but I'd already eaten.

£2.40 for the excellent coffee.

9/10

Six Eight Kafé
6/8 Temple Row
Birmingham
B2 5HG

http://www.sixeightkafe.co.uk/

Create, Wakefield

If there's one restaurant in Leeds that I really regret failing to dine it while I had the chance, it's Create. At this point I could launch into a lengthy and fawning report on the Create organisation, explaining the great work that they do and why you should all give them your support, but given that I didn't bother giving them mine up until now, I won't. It would be patronising and I'd probably be preaching to the converted anyway.

On the off chance you didn't already know, Create are a social enterprise, widely lauded for their work with vulnerable people, sort of like Jamie Oliver's Fifteen without the super-celeb backing. Their Leeds restaurant recently closed for a refurbishment and restructure, from which I hope they return as soon as possible. News of the closure did seem a little ominous though, with talk of 'today's harsh economy' and 'tough commercial realities'.

The honest and truthful reason I hope they're back soon, any guilty feelings aside, is that the food sounded bloody wonderful. Praised by bloggers and critics alike, I don't think I read anything negative about the place, and the menus always read beautifully. You know the kind where deciding becomes a chore as it all sounds so damn good?

From the most recent menu, still online at the moment, how about 'Salt cod fritters, sweet pickled onion salad, radish, sourdough' to start, followed by 'Char-grilled skirt steak, wild mushroom gratin, chips, watercress'. And for pudding: 'Sticky toffee pudding, parkin crumble, caramel sauce and milk sorbet'. If that doesn't get you salivating there's something wrong with you.

So the Leeds restaurant may be on hiatus, but Create have also opened a new cafe in Wakefield One, the new building housing a range of council services including the city's museum and central library. First thing to mention: well done to Wakefield Council for giving the concession to Create, and not going for the obvious choice of either a) Costa, or b) one of the anonymous but equally crap giant catering co's.

I stopped in there for coffee and a snack last week, and was pleased to discover it lived up to the high expectations I had for the brand. The coffee, a flat white, wasn't particularly well made, coming from one of those funny auto-espresso machines, but still tasted pretty good as they're using quality beans from local roasters Grumpy Mule.

To eat, an Eccles cake. It might not look much, but what do you expect from currant stuffed pastry? Reassuringly mis-shapen, and a buttery delight to eat, I think it's safe to assume that they're making the food from scratch so I'm keen to return and try the lunchtime offerings.

The guy who served me was also lovely and friendly, and prices are very fair (cheaper than both the big chains and the more upmarket independents).

To sum up, let's hope Create can continue to succeed, and here's to the re-opening of the Leeds restaurant. I for one won't be missing out next time around.

8/10

Wakefield One
Burton Street
Wakefield
WF1 2DD

http://www.foodbycreate.co.uk/restaurant

Bean and Bud, Harrogate

We stopped off for a late lunch in Harrogate a week last Friday after a trip to Fountains Abbey (lovely, best bit the mill, need to return in less miserable weather). It was way past proper meal time, especially given that we were heading home for a steak dinner, so sandwiches and coffee seemed like the best bet.

Bean and Bud served a pretty good flat white, texture-wise spot on, smooth as you like and balanced between coffee and milk. It was just a little bland for my taste though, not really delivering the complex flavours advertised. There were a choice of two espresso blends with quite differing descriptions, one fruitier and the other darker with more pronounced bitterness. We chose one of each but I couldn't discern the difference. Under-strength coffee or maybe my palate is shot? I'm not really sure.

The sandwiches were all pre-made and cling film wrapped, but didn't seem to have suffered as a result. Cheese and tomato tasted fresh and was made with good quality bread and something sharp and a bit crumbly (either a cheddar or an older, more mature Lancashire or similar) from local suppliers the Cheeseboard. A basic sandwich but a good one, like what you'd make to take to work on a 'can be bothered' sort of a day.

Worth a visit if you need a caffeine fix in Harrogate. I'd certainly like to give the coffee another chance to find out whether I was having a tasting off-day. Prices about average for an indie coffee shop, that being a little bit cheaper than the biggest chains (but a good bit better).

7/10

14 Commercial Street
Harrogate
HG1 1TY

http://www.beanandbud.co.uk/

Tea Hive, Chorlton, Manchester

On a brief visit to Chorlton last week I ended up having lunch at Tea Hive completely by chance. I was planning on picking up a few bits from Barbakan deli and it just caught my eye as I'd almost walked past, the white on black signage meaning I almost mistook it for the Marble Beer House a couple of doors down.

I'm glad I took the time to investigate further, as lunch there was very good. A flat white was well made if a little too large for my tastes. I've definitely come to the conclusion that the smaller 6oz cup size is the best, anything larger (this was an 8oz I think) and it verges into latte territory where the milkiness starts to drown out the character of the coffee. Bonus points for the novel artwork though!

My sandwich took an age to arrive, but the tardiness was acknowledged and handled well. An apology and a free drink to tide me over were offered before I'd had the chance to chase up the order.

When it did arrive, the Cheshire smokehouse hot smoked salmon with lemon mayo and rocket on granary bread was well worth the wait. Generous quantities of rich, firm fleshed, moderately smoked fish was balanced perfectly by the acidic dressing and peppery rocket.

A really fine sarnie, with one additional plus point: good butter. It's surprising how many otherwise quality sandwich shops and cafes think it's fine to use cheap sunflower spread. Don't do it. Butter or nothing at all please.

The side salad was also a proper salad, with multiple components and a balanced dressing, and as a result the £4.95 price tag for the sandwich seemed fair. The flat white was £2.35 so all in all not a cheap lunch, but a very good one, served in pleasant surroundings by nice people.


8/10

53 Manchester Road
Chorlton
Manchester
M21 9PW

http://www.teahive.co.uk

Home Sweet Home, Manchester

I really should stop listening to my cantankerous brain. Home Sweet Home is another of those places I'd written off as probably being a bit rubbish due to some misguided preconception or other. In this case it was a vague notion, from past glances through the window and at the menu, that it combined two food fashions I'm not that much in love with (sort of half way between twee tea shop and American inspired filthy food joint).

I don't think that categorisation is too far wide of the mark, but who cares whether there's actually any concept or not, the important thing is that the food and drink is really good. A Cheeseburger toastie could easily be a big greasy mistake, but in practice turned out to be bloody lovely. It wasn't exactly lacking in grease, but all of the oozy cheesy beefy richness was offset perfectly by the bite and crunch of gherkin spears. Just as you'd find with an actual cheeseburger of course. 

Thin-ish fries, skin on with a good potatoey flavour were worth adding for £2, even if I didn't really need them (when asked 'do you want fries with that?' the instinctive response can only be yes), and the coleslaw was decent stuff if a bit too creamy for my tastes.

A flat white was very well made, velvety smooth with quite a mild tasting coffee. It was served in a glass which seems to be a Manchester thing as North Tea Power do the same (all of my favourite coffee shops east of the Pennines use cups).

I'd definitely return to try more of the menu. Service is friendly and quick, the food is good and the prices fair. The cheeseburger toastie will set you back £4.50 with coleslaw, fries are £2 extra. Not the cheapest of lunches but a pretty monumental one. £2.20 for the coffee. 

Home Sweet Home is the business. Don't let my brain tell you otherwise.

8/10

Edge Street

Northern Quarter

Manchester

M4 1HE

http://cheeseburgertoastie.co.uk

Peli Deli, Matlock, Derbyshire

I might, whisper it, be leaving the North. Last time I did that I moved to south east London. Nothing quite so drastic is on the cards this time but it's highly likely I shall end up residing in that strange netherworld known as the MIDLANDS.

Not ideal for a blog named Northern Food, especially when I've already had to ditch the M62 bit, my preferred transpennine route being the Woodhead pass these days. I shall probably get away with it though, Chesterfield is hardly in Kent now is it?

The upshot of all this upheaval is that I'll be blogging from Derbyshire with increasing frequency, and what better place to start than Matlock. An exploratory trip to the region ended up with us stopping for lunch there, with Peli Deli looking like the best of a limited supply of cafés (it was a Sunday afternoon, and much of the town was closed).

It turned out ok, but I wouldn't rush back. A flat white was more like a latte with a pattern on top, too big and milky and lacking that beautiful velvety texture you get from a good example.

A salt beef sandwich brought generous slices of high quality, tender meat in fresh, nutty bread. All good but let down by the use of some sort of spread rather than butter, and a bright but completely undressed side salad. 

It's not cheap here, but I suppose Matlock is one of the pricier parts of Derbyshire. £4.25 for the salt beef sarnie, £2.40 for the coffee, and over a fiver for A's cheese and ham panini.


6/10


1 Jubilee Buildings
Crown Square
Matlock
Derbyshire
DE4 3AT

http://www.pelideli.com/ 

Marmadukes Café Deli, Sheffield

A Twitter recommendation brought me to Marmadukes in search of good coffee. They use a Monmouth espresso blend and that quality really shines through. My flat white was a beauty, smooth with a bold, fruity flavour. Excellent stuff.

Other than the coffee there are good looking cakes, sandwiches, savouries and salads to be had, and the café is an attractive place to sit for a while, either inside or at one of a few tables outside on Norfolk Row, a pleasant pedestrianised side street. Blankets are provided to keep out the chill, a nice touch.

I ate on this visit too, quiche lorraine and salad. The quiche was perfectly fine but the salad was no more than a garnish. If you're charging £1.50 extra for salad, then a spoonful of some of the proper salads behind the counter might be a more appropriate choice than a very small handful of limp leaves, even if they are properly dressed.

The added leaves brought the cost of the food up to six quid, which I wouldn't take issue with at all if it was a proper plate of savoury with salads, but it wasn't that. The coffee was marvellous though, so maybe stick to that and give the cakes a try.

7/10 (a combination of 9 for the coffee and 5 for the meal)

Edit: see comments - Tim the cafe owner says the lack of a proper salad was their mistake, I should have been offered one from the counter. I'll pay another visit sometime soon, defo for coffee and maybe for food too.
22a Norfolk Row
Sheffield
S1 2PA

https://www.facebook.com/marmadukescafedeli

Northern Food on tour: New Year in London part 1

Mega-post alert. We spent three nights in London over the new year festivities, you might not be surprised to discover that eating was a very important part of the trip. By very important I mean that's mostly what we did, alongside the drinking of course.

I'll never get round to writing up each meal individually, so here's a warts and all round-up, good and bad, in mostly chronological order, of the whole lot.

To make things a little more manageable I've split the post into two, this first one covers the casual and the unplanned, the second post will be of the two slightly more upmarket places we ate at.

Ikea, Milton Keynes

You'll probably be aware that Scandinavian food is the hot ticket right now. The Nordic dining revolution has made the short voyage across the sea to our shores, and is making waves in London and the South-east. It's an intriguing mix, connecting food to culture with an almost palpable sense of place, ground-breaking in its sourcing and preparation of foraged ingredients, terroir on the plate in the most literal way.

What better way, we thought, than to introduce ourselves to this cuisine with a trip to a restaurant run by an organisation that's done more than any other to bring Scandinavian food to the people of Britain. So we went to Ikea in Milton Keynes for lunch. As you do.

I'm not quite sure how it came about, but it was something like this: no breakfast + bored on the M1 + traffic jam + discussion about meatballs + pouring rain making original outdoor plans unlikely = sod it let's go to Ikea for lunch.

The meatballs are an experience. Nice in a rubbery, filthy sort of way, but I'm not convinced by the weird milky gravy. And the lingonberry stuff is just crap jam. Crap jam with weird milky gravy isn't a great combination I don't think. Next time I might have my meatballs unadorned.

We had apple cake with vanilla sauce for pudding. I really enjoyed the cake, it was moist with good fat chunks of tart apple in. Scan-delicious! The sauce was rubbish again though. It had the taste and texture of Bird's custard after you've mixed the powder into the milk but before you've cooked it. Weird.

Would I go again? Yes, it's inevitable. Avoid the weird sauces. Cheap.

5/10

Bletcham Way
Milton Keynes
MK1 1QB

http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/store/milton_keynes


Baozi Inn Takeaway, Chinatown

Baozi Inn is a little Sichuan cafe in Chinatown, I've eaten there a couple of times but not for a few years. The good news is they've opened a little takeaway next door that sells nothing but skewers and buns.

The skewers (£1.00-£1.20 each) are boiled to order in a dirty great vat of spicy broth laced with salt, chilli and Sichuan pepper. The result is stonkingly good: tender morsels of meat or veg intensely flavoured from the broth. There are loads of varieties, I only got as far as lamb and enoki mushroom, both of which were great.

The buns (bao) are big fat steamed dough monsters stuffed with pork and onion, sturdy and filling for the harsh winters in Northern China (or to fill a 15 Ikea meatball sized space before a trip to theatre). Two quid each.

8/10

27 Newport Court
Chinatown
London
WC2H 7JS


Princi, Soho

Princi is the sort of place I wish existed elsewhere in the UK, but just doesn't. This sort of thing only seems to work with the critical mass of London.

It's a big bustling Italian bakery-cafeteria-bar-takeaway. You shove your way to a space at the counter, shout out your order from an impressive display of baked goods, pizza, filled focaccia, salads, pasta, meat dishes and god knows what else, collect your drinks from the bar then elbow your way to any vacant space on the communal tables. Not the place for peace and quiet, but for a lively drink or two accompanied by some quality snacks (or a three course dinner if you feel like it) it's an excellent choice.

Pasta pesto and mozzarella and tomato salad were both very good. Beautiful milky cheese, tomatoes with some semblance of taste (which will do for me at the end of December) and grassy, herbal pesto. The pizza was just ok though, I'm never a fan of the thick rectangles of pizza a taglio stuff, not even in Italy.

Given the central location prices are reasonable. We paid just over a tenner for the food and a bottle of water.

7/10

135 Wardour Street
Soho
London
W1F 0UT

http://www.princi.com/




Full Stop Cafe, Brick Lane

A pleasant coffee shop with a few comfy sofas. The coffee, when it eventually arrived after nigh on twenty minutes, was satisfyingly robust. Yes I know that quality coffee isn't made in an instant, but twenty minutes is still too long in a not very busy place.

Still, at least we got to amuse ourselves eavesdropping on the conversation at the neighbouring table during the wait. This being East London hipster central it was mostly about their unbridled talent going unrecognised, this being the fault of others, his issues with anger and hers with Tatiana, ya? The joy.

£2.70 for a flat white. A bit much but probably par for the course in these parts. And still cheaper than Costa so on second thoughts that's good value.

7/10

202 Brick Lane
London
E1 6SA


The Breakfast Club, Spitalfields

We only ended up at the Breakfast Club as our original brunch choice was closed over Christmas and New Year. It was good enough to entice us back on New Year's Day for a hangover cure before the journey home.

It was an infuriating place though, with the makings of excellence being let down by shoddy execution in parts. The coffee was just ok, too milky and not very well made.

The bacon sandwich was also a misfire, but I shan't bang on about it having already done so here.

But the cinnamon French toast with roasted apples and syrup was bloody lovely, so much so that I voted it my breakfast of the year (and shared a plateful the day after, making it a contender for the 2013 award too!).

The half monty breakfast continued the trend. Beautifully poached eggs of unusually high quality (dark yellow yolks that actually tasted of something) balanced out by everything else on the plate being mediocre.

Breakfast plates are priced from around six quid up to a tenner, fair enough, but drinks are a little pricey. Service is brisk and the atmosphere verging on raucous, busy with loud music. Depending on your level of delicacy this could be a good or bad thing.

7/10

12-16 Artillery Lane
Spitalfields
London
E1 7LS

http://www.thebreakfastclubcafes.com/

Bragazzi's, Abbeydale Road, Sheffield

I discovered Bragazzi's completely by accident while checking out what Abbeydale Road had to offer. The original plan was a dosa lunch at either Dhanistha's or East and West, but both were deserted and I wasn't in the mood for completely solitary dining. The south Indian fix will have to wait for another day.

It turned out to be a very happy accident, Bragazzi's is an Italian deli and café of unusually high quality. A small cappuccino was easily the equal of anything I've had in the recent influx of independent coffee shops, beautifully made with a complex, roasted flavour.

A mortadella, mozzarella, pesto, olive and tomato sandwich was also marvellous. I did wonder whether having it toasted was going to be a mistake, I always instinctively say yes when offered but toasting a good sandwich can be a bad idea when it ends up overdone; - the bread dessicated and the filling too hot to taste. 

I needn't have worried, this was just gently pressed so the cheese had melted. Layers of paper thin sliced meat with mild, milky, stringy cheese, salty olives and bright, herbal pesto. The best sandwich I've had in ages.

The café would be a great place to while away a few hours with the papers, or you can takeaway. Prices are more than reasonable for the quality, the coffee was £1.80 and the sandwich £3.60. Highly recommended.

9/10

220-226 Abbeydale Road
Sheffield
S7 1FL

http://www.bragazzis.co.uk