address: 134 Brixton Hill, Brixton, London SW2

Opening times – 10am to 10pm everyday

You may have overeaten during the Christmas break and/or are now suffering from a lack of cash so we thought that we would help with a few recommendations that will not break the bank. This one resulted from a lack of planning after seeing the early Saturday showing of Fantastic Beasts in Streatham. We headed back to Brixton with one thing on our mind – food. Our original destination, Negril, was full to bursting but next door there is this restaurant/cafe. At any other time we might have ignored it – now very glad we didn’t. This cafe serves coffee and pancakes (savoury galettes and sweet crepes) and was totally empty when we visited. We assume this is fare for lunch or a late afternoon snack but now we know it hits the spot for dinner too.

There are a few tables and chairs on two levels and it is all very Zen. In the back there is a library of worthy philosophy and self help books and in addition to the welcome fan heater there is a perfumed mist pumped into the air. Galettes can be cooked in front of your eyes but we preferred the locality of the fan heater.

The food is all worthily vegetarian or vegan. Their galette is a buckwheat pancake and we think cheese is essential so opted for vegetarian options. We chose a Farmer which has free range egg, cheese and spinach and a Red Goat (spinach, beetroot, goat cheese and sweet potato. Both came with an interesting salad (carrot, bean shoots, beetroot and more spinach). Flavours were subtle but interesting and both were slightly sweet with dressing and herbs. They were also huge and definitely hit that empty spot leaving us no room for more. As they cool the galette does become a little tough so we gave up with the knife and fork, got rid of some crusty bits and picked them up.

We washed them down with jasmine tea and an apple and ginger juice.

This is definitely comfort food and we will not be rushing back just yet although great to know it is likely to have an empty seat on a cold, damp night. It is also relatively cheap with the total bill being only £16.20 and it could be cheaper if we had chosen differently.