Another of the new restaurants popping up in Market Row is Tapas Pa’ti (translated to Tapas For You) a place advertised as serving home cooked Spanish tapas. With an open front and tables both inside and out, Spanish music playing in the background and the red brick décor and dark wood the place has a real feels of a traditional Spanish bar.

Before I begin on the food I must point out that the eatinbrixton gang are frequent visitors of Spain, meaning we are huge fans of tapas. One thing I love about tapas is the environment that you eat it in. With baking heat, Salsa music playing in the background, a leg of ham hanging from the bar and usually a couple of regulars who seem to always be hanging around, all create the mood of a Spanish bar. Luckily this place creates that for us (although don’t rely on the weather!).

We were advised by the lovely front of house lady that we should go for four tapas dishes for the two of us and then a torradas (toasted bread) with roasted peppers and aubergines to share. We chose chorizo cooked in wine, garlic prawns, patatas bravas, garlic chicken. Although we were slightly worried we over ordered, we managed to devour it all. Special mention must go to the patatas bravas which makes me want to return as soon as possible as well as the garlic prawns whose sauce is perfect mopped up with the complimentary bread. Currently there is a great deal going on in which if you get two tapas you get a glass of sangria all for £12. The Sangria is lovely, although perhaps the portions could be bigger as it is extremely easy to drink!

What I really enjoyed about our dinner is that this place isn’t faddy or trying to be anything else but a good quality, traditional tapas restaurant. Unfortunately on this Thursday evening the place was completely empty, which might have had something to do with the heat wave going on outside, or the fact that not many people know about this little gem, so I really advise you to spread the word about this place.

It came to £33 for two people; great value for money considering we had two drinks each and plenty of food for the both of us. Another trip is being planned soon – if only to try the delicious patatas bravas again!

www.primadonnabrixton.co.uk

I never wanted to start a review with the sentence ‘The problem with this restaurant is…’ but I don’t feel creative enough to say it another way. So … the problem with this restaurant is its USP (unique selling point). It has an Italian name, a Portuguese/Brazilian style of food at dinner and it plays music from Radio 1. Described as an cafe/restaurant the breakfast menu looks English yet lunch seems to be more Brazilian. I quite like novelty but this is so eclectic that may be difficult for passers by to understand (and be drawn to) its open doors. This is a shame as it probably deserves encouragement.

This is a new restaurant in Market Row rather than in Brixton Village and it builds a new epicurean alleyway particularly as the Village is getting fuller and fuller and hard for the casual visitor to be sure of getting fed. Small tables (for two) are inside and outside. Its white walls have little adornment (well there isn’t much wall in there) and across the back wall is the kitchen.

The dinner menu (to distinguish it from the breakfast or lunch menus) is very short. Only four things for a main course – Piri Piri chicken, Soy Glazed Ribs, Tiger Prawn platter and Courgette fritters. All come with fries (delicious chunks of fried potato served with tomato ketchup) and some come with a small salad and the Prima Donna salsa. We of course had to start off with some olives, which get a thumbs up from us, making a change from many of the local restaurants.

We chose piri piri chicken with individually tailored level of heat and one portion the ribs. Both my dinner companions chose the half chicken – the quarter chicken was only a small amount of money less. It was a bit short on sauce but was acceptable and the ribs were plentiful. My corn on the cob was a bit watery as I assume that it had been left floating in water for a little too long. There are no desserts but there is good coffee and cake (bought in from Maurillio). We chose the frangipan and the cheesecake. Both were a great end to our meat filled dinner.

We washed the whole meal down with Sangre beer (£3.00 per pint) and tap water. The service was very attentive with lots of opportunities to ask for anything we wanted and lots of checks to make sure we were fine. Prices were also very reasonable with the total cost of £48.30 for three. It is open Monday through Sunday but only in the evening from Thursday to Saturday when it closes at 11.30 so you will now be able to eat after a visit to the Ritzy.

On a side note we feel that as this place seems to concentrate on breakfast, lunch and dinner we will make sure we visit again soon for breakfast and update this review with our thoughts.

69-73 Atlantic Road, SW9 8PU

0208 127 8677

This is a little gem, filling a place in Brixton for a classier Chinese restaurant. The unassuming entrance leads into a bar area filled with golden birdcages and low lights. The restaurant decor is not the eclectic throw it together kind – it is simple with matching tables and comfortable chairs and benches. Lighting is Chinese style but not on the bling side – no red lanterns. It is an area of calm – until the tables begin to be filled.

This is a Dim Sum restaurant with a Brixton flare. We have the usual steamed Dim Sum (prawn, chicken and roast pork) but there is the oddball of jerk chicken in rice wrapped in a palm leaf. This looked relatively unassuming when it arrived – just green on the outside and white on the inside. But it was really delicious – full of ginger with not a hint of chilli but a big dose that grew in warmth but didn’t overpower the delicate rice and the really well cooked chicken.

We also had our staple – fried squid which came with a topping of scented pepper and a dipping sauce of chilli and tomato. We were expecting more of the chilli and one of us supplemented it with the extra chilis on the table.  The chicken and coriander steamed dumplings were simply flavoured so you could taste all the ingredients.

We also decided to try the sweets – that is what they were…very …very sweet. The rose sorbet was a bit cloying and perhaps they should try essence instead of so much syrup. The warm black sesame balls were unusual and we decided they were interesting enough to try again.

We chose three dishes each and there was enough – although the heartier appetites might try four dishes to be on the safe side. Most dishes come in groups of three so you can easily share. There is also good advice on how much to choose.

Drinks too are for the safe – various pots of tea such as the Dragonwell which seems to be their staple tea.  The beer is also an adventure – one rose flavoured beer called the Animee was surprisingly refreshing, but could not be consumed in copious amounts, the second had the scent of honey but not sweet taste – from Mexico. There is also a good list of wines by the bottle. On the other hand and not for the faint hearted are the cocktails. We had the Courtier, whisky and lapsong souchong tea and the Wang Zhaojun, which mainly tasted of watered down Parma violets.

Service was with a smile and we had all three of the waitresses over the course of the meal. For around 20 quid each this is quite pricey for Brixton, but serves as more of a special occasion place to dine in Brixton than perhaps other eateries. We were there early on a Wednesday and they were filling up so perhaps later in the week it would be an idea to book for this welcome addition to Brixton’s cuisines.

With absolutely no idea what a French Dip consisted of, but hearing plenty of buzz about it on Twitter we headed down to the Station Road Saturday market yesterday to find out for ourselves. The stall was about half way down the road; just by Hive Bar and had a couple of chairs dotted around the stall meaning you can enjoy your sandwich in the buzzy atmosphere of the market.

Apparently originating from restaurants in Los Angeles, a French Dip consists of a roast beef sandwich with the bread dipped in gravy or jus. Served alongside a gherkin this is pretty simple, but incredibly delicious. The beef was thinly cut, with just the right amount of fat and perfectly cooked – meaning there is no tug of war with the beef in your sandwich when you bite into it. The gherkin on the side was very appreciated, especially when I made the mistake of putting far too much mustard on my sandwich, causing my nose to feel like it might explode. Tip: less is more!  However I do think they may have creating a new French Dip enthusiast!

Another plus was that all the ingredients appear to be local with M Moens and Son in Clapham providing the beef and Kindred Bakery in Herne Hill providing the baguettes, which had a lovely shiny glaze to them. I was informed that the next one will be on the 19^th May so would really recommend making a visit to the stall that weekend.

Congrats London French Dip we think you make a brilliant addition to the interesting and diverse foods available in Brixton!

telephone: 020 727-4221

email: hello@thebrickbox.co.uk

http://www.thebrickbox.co.uk/brixton.html

Brick Box, in the heart of Brixton Village, describes itself with some hyperbole as a place for art, love and magic. We were not totally convinced; however, it does serve food, so of course we had to review it. With the usual wooden tables and mismatched chairs, it squeezes in tables at angles in the small internal space and outside in the alleyway so it has much seating. It is extremely popular so at 6.45 on a Friday the outside tables were full and we were lucky to even get an inside table. This was in comparison to other restaurants which were relatively empty at that time. One explanation fir this might be the happy hour which starts at 5pm.

The venue says it provides for a number of events including screenings, live art (?) and theatre which will be a bit of a coup given the size of the place. Most events seem actually to happen in their Tooting site although the walls are covered with art.

This community arts group have partnered with Senzala in Brixton to provide the food- a  range of sweet and savoury crepes and galettes – and of course a fully licensed bar which seemed to be attracting the most custom. We ordered a Caprinha and a lemon daiquiri to get us into the spirit  and, sorry but they were both a bit of a disappointment. They were more like alcopops rather than cocktails so we wished we had chosen the wine.

The menu comes in two section – the savoury and the sweet crepes. There is some allergy advice on the menu and you can get a wheat, gluten, lactose and egg free gallette which is what we chose. We ordered the Senzala and the Caramelised goat. These were very similar – rocket and cheese (gorgonzola or goat’s cheese), caramelised red onions and mixed herbs with the addition of sun dried tomatoes in the Senzala. They were plump and the gallette was thin and crispy but stuck together enough to allow you to get all the bits into your mouth at the same time. We enjoyed them but we want to point out that if you highlight the caramelised red onions on the menu then they do need to be caramelised and not just a bit sweet and limp.

Service was fast for ordering and helpful  - pointing out that we should try the homemade chili sauce as we would never have noticed it in the sugar container. A little of it went a long way – but it does add spice to the cheesy mix. We were surprised at how much better the galettes were on this occasion from a previous visit when we had the Spaniard which was a bit limp with too little filling. We didn’t repeat the choice so we can’t verify a change in this one.

We didn’t have a sweet crepe but they looked more variable with mixtures of the following ingredients – bananas, nuts, Belgian chocolate (white, milk or dark), rum, coconut, nutella and maple syrup. We just went to Lab G for an ice cream – two pancakes in the same meal definitely seemed one too many.

Our bill was £21.00 for two including the drinks and they do provide tap water on the table. Wine is about £15.00 and cocktails around £6.00

We might go back next time for a cup of tea and a sweet pancake which would make a change from the cupcake offerings in most of the other tea shops in Brixton Village.

Telephone:

email: elranchodelalo@hotmail.co.uk

http://www.facebook.com/pages/El-Rancho-De-Lalo/156815314336773

El Rancho de Lalo has been in Brixton Village for as long as we can remember and, despite the area’s recent renaissance in smart modern eateries, its simple approach to Colombian food still seems to be holding its own. Located on the Coldharbour Lane side of the Village, the restaurant’s exterior still manages to stand out with a tidy awning, dark wooden detail, and half a dozen tables outside. The interior is simply furnished with an open kitchen displaying hanging sausages and a couple of chefs hard at work. The service was friendly, came with a smile and, although not advertised on the menu, provided us with a couple of Corona beers served with lemon, and a surprisingly refreshing Kiwi juice.

The menu was short with similar looking dishes throughout. As with other South American Cuisines Colombian food is relatively simple mostly consisting of meat, rice, and beans. A couple of us ordered the Colombian National dish, the £10 Bandeja Paisa, which was more of a platter than a dish, consisting of a large Colombian Sausage, thinly cut steak, crispy pork belly, kidney beans in a dark sauce, a mound of rice topped with a fried egg, corn bread, avocado, salad and a slice of plantain. All in all it was pretty delicious. The sausage was beautifully spiced, the steak well cooked, the avocado perfectly ripe and the unlikely presence of an egg somehow seemed to work. The other member of our party went for the £10 pork that came with similar trimmings plus a potato and was, by all reports, pretty tasty. As is probably clear from the sheer quantity of components, the portions were huge, and could quite easily have been shared.

Dessert was super sweet figs, a semi solid serving of caramel and a white Colombian Cheese. The saltiness of the cheese worked well with the sweetness of the figs and the caramel bound the two together perfectly.

El Rancho de Lalo is a simple restaurant serving simple, well executed food. If you’re a big fan of meat, looking to fill yourself up, and not willing to spend more than a tenner when doing so, this is probably the place for you.

Opening Hours Mon – Wed: 09:00 – 19:00 Thurs: 09:00 – 22:00 Fri – Sat: 09:00 – 19:00

telephone: 020 7998 3309

email: market@sevenatbrixton.com

http://sevenatbrixton.wordpress.com/

We have now visited Seven four times and feel it is time for a review as we have seen it busy, empty and when you can get a table but still feel it’s buzz. Seven is a Spanish style cocktail bar in the now, less fashionable, Market Row near to Franco Manca. It also serves food to soak up the alcohol. But they also have coffee and it is a welcome quiet haven on a Sunday when Brixton Village is heaving and you realise that you should have booked a seat.

Cheap cocktails include dirty martinis, non-orthodox cocktails (bramble comes in a teacup with a cupcake on the saucer) and old fashioneds (spirits, bitters and no sugary fruit additives) as well as Spanish beer. The bartender (who never seems to get a night off) spoke to us each time we visited and is helpful, as well as charming. He explained about all the types of drinks and had time to chat about the food – well on one occasion we were the only customers – but on others, even when we had to squeeze past other diners, we still got a little chat.

Decor is quirky. Downstairs we tried out a bench surrounded by heaters, another time we were relegated to a table made out of an old trunk – which if it hadn’t been quaint we would probably have tried to swap as it is hard balancing coffee on such a vaguely curved table with ridges. We also ventured upstairs which is a warren of small rooms each with its own ambience – wall paper with writing on it, low tables, dark romantic looking corners and high bar stools with an accompanying table – take your pick. It is definitely surreal, especially the large anglepoise. But tall people beware there will be a lot of ducking. It is also warmer upstairs when there is a February chill in the air.

Quirky is also a word to describe the luggage tag menus which are blessedly short. The suitcase references are a nod to the shop’s past. Food is tapas and the larger sized pinxtos (sounds like pinchos). These you pay for by the stick – £2 each and at the end they add up the sticks – exactly like you would in the some Catalan and Basque parts of Spain. They include anchovy, chilli and tomato, or chorizo and manchego as well as figs and other less usual combinations. There are some hot dishes too but we chose the meat plate to share with padron peppers on the side and a bottle of Rioja (after a cocktail). The Rioja was very good and there was certainly enough food to stop us feeling hungry for the rest of the night.

You can spend time here playing games and reading books which are arranged by colour not size or subject. They also have wifi. However, staying too long in the current cold months really requires a few layers of clothes as the whole bar is open to the market. Blankets and heaters help but on one occasion I kept my coat and scarf on.

Opening times are variable even though it seems to be open every day. We went on a Monday night when it was completely empty apart from two wifi addicts and left at 8.00 pm when the security man came and asked everyone to leave. We had to make a “Mission Impossible” run at the barrier which was half closed and shimmy underneath. I like this bar – it is one of the friendly ones and they do seem to have got their act together. Try it on a sunday when you might have a warming cocktail – usually only a fiver. The shared plate is aobut £7.00

telephone:

This small cafe on Coldharbour Lane is a favourite throughout the day for those wanting a fix of a Full English. We have had breakfast and lunch at the Duck Egg Cafe and so thought it was about time for a review.

For breakfast we arrived at about 10.30 and it was already pretty busy (there was even a queue for tables at one point). It is so small that sharing tables is almost essential and you are so close to the other diners that it is very hard not to eavesdrop. However I’ve noticed this is a theme throughout restaurants in Brixton so I say embrace it. The service was very friendly and the seating comfortable.

We ordered a bacon and egg sandwich (boring choice I must confess) and the Full English (obviously had to try this!). You get a choice between hen or duck eggs and of course we went for the duck eggs as it seemed silly not to. Service was quick, big plus as my stomach rumbles were getting louder and louder. The full English came with all the trimmings, sausage, bacon, mushrooms, toast, egg (poached) and baked beans. The egg was cooked to perfection with the yolk breaking to reveal the golden runny centre which all poached eggs should have. Sausages were also a plus point, not sure if they were local or not, but they were a stand out part of the meal.

Tea, coffees and juices are the drinks of choice with the juice coming fresh. Other breakfast options include eggs Benedict, which is most definitely on the list to try on our next visit.

Breakfast was £8 for the full english and a cup of tea, while the egg and bacon sandwich was about a fiver with a coffee. Great choice for a lazy weekend brunch.

For lunch again it was a sharing experience and crowded. We had the special soup of the day but we noticed that other plates were heaving with pasta and chips. Again not a cheap meal but it was hearty and filling.  You can also choose breakfast options throughout in the day  as well as the pasta options.

We will be returning when we are very hungry to make the most of it.

telephone: 020 7733 2335

email:  info@veranda-london.com

http://veranda-london.com/

Veranda describes itself as a restaurant, cocktail bar and art gallery – and they are right. The entrance is a small hall (so people can be stopped if they are not invited) and the first part of the long room is  the bar with small tables and some (but not much) comfortable seating. Most people cluster at the bar. At the back are the same small tables but now covered with white linen table cloths with white linen napkins. These tables are overlooked by the disc jockey who peers through an opening surrounded by a picture frame. In fact it took a couple of minutes to realise that this was not part of the art gallery on the surrounding walls.  The gallery on our visit contained paintings – some predictable – red shimmering vistas and African images – but some very interesting photographs of people and landscapes.

We usually talk about the food first but this is not in the rules and the cocktails are prolific and between 5 and 8 some are cheaper than usual (£4.50 vs £7.50)pm and luckily we arrived at 7.30. The cocktail list is actually a book. We didn’t count but there must be more than ten a page and down the margin there is a very helpful guide of how long the drink is using glass shapes. This alleviates the difficult task of trying to guess from the ingredients. We chose a rose and fresh lychee martini and a beer (hard to find at the back of the “book”). The martini was like a martini because of the shape of the glass and smelt very strongly of rose and tasted of lychee. It was also very pretty with a cherry at the bottom of the glass giving the cloudy liquid a rosy glow. I suspect it was very alcoholic (it also contains gin) – it is very difficult to tell in this alcopop. It was lovely but I doubt that I could drink too many because of the sweetness but there are lots more to choose from.

For the food we would have had several of the things on the menu as there was gourmet oxtail, jerk chicken, 3 fish curry, curry goat, and more and more. We chose a plate to share starting with ackee and saltfish parcels. There were three of them (we were warned) – small packets of fried filo pastry. We liked them but the ackee was a bit lacking but the taste of saltfish came through and it was an easy way of eating them. Our plate was the Veranda Supreme which had curry goat and ital curry both in a crispy pastry basket and jerk chicken and Escovitch fish. This all came with rice and peas, coleslaw and fried golden plantain. The fish was hot and spicy – particularly the lavish chilli. The jerk chicken was soft and the sauce was hot but not too fierce. Altogether a good tasting choice but next time I will go for the goat curry. It was complexly flavoured and not too hot so all the flavours came through. Rice and peas — well what can go wrong. The plantain was sweet and had been made sweeter by a syrup. We did share but we didn’t manage to finish the plate.

There were few desserts available – only one – apple and mango crumble. This was not like any crumble we have ever had. It was a hot and sweet sauce and covered with a biscuit crumb topping which arrived with a small portion of delicious ginger ice cream. But on the whole we wouldn’t order this again. The mango was completely lost and perhaps they should just stick to apple.

The night we were there we were waiting for a famous visitor – Sir John Holt – who didn’t arrive while we were there but despite the preparation needed for this from the waiters they were still charming to us. We ate from the a la carte menu but if you book in advance you can eat a mid-week feast cheap (14.50 for two courses or 17.50 for three courses). Our meal was £25.00 per person including the drinks (a cocktail and three beers). We didn’t book but t was not that busy before about 8.15 – after that time you would need to book.

telephone: 020 7274 5373

email:  info@kaff-bar.co.uk

http://www.kaff-bar.co.uk

Open since September this little cafe/bar offers free wifi and is open across the day and at the weekend offers live music and djs until 2am. It has comfy sofas and small tables and during the day is laid back with laptop users and buggies. It gets fuller in the evenings and particularly the weekend. The service is friendly and helpful. The food is Caribbean but they have an arrangement with Ichi-ban Sushi which is jus down the road to extend their menu at the weekend. The Caribbean food is made by Julie – who cooks off site as there is no working kitchen as yet. This is still a work in progress.

During the week its coffee and cakes (mostly Jamaican) or beer, rum and Brixton brewed ginger beer (hot and cold) and Po-Boys (filled baguettes with salad) and a select Caribbean menu. They serve all the usuals – jamaica patties, jerk chicken, goat curry, rice and peas with cabbage or callaloo in cheap “mini meals”. But we chose a meat plate to share. This is probably something that would go down well with beer rather than our choice of an Americana and banana flavoured hot chocolate but it was after exercise and 4.00pm so not really alcohol time. The plate was easily enough to share and included three different small patties (meat, fish and veggie), barbecued wings, plantain and dumplings  - all served with chilli or sweet chili sauce. All, except the dumpling, were great. There was enough sauce on the wings and they slipped easily off the bone, the plantains was sweet and the patties interesting. But It takes a lot of sauce or liquid to make a dumpling to go down. I won’t be ordering a banana flavoured hot chocolate again either.

This is a cheap place for food – not overwhelming in size or cost. On Fridays they even have two pints for a fiver. It was about £6.50 per person for our meal and drinks. We liked the ambiance and will certainly return probably still for coffee and free wifi but also for the free cake club on Sunday – just take along your own cake to compete.