Your starter for ten. No conferring, now. Do you know your ntaba from your nkwobi? Or your bobolo from your attiéké? If you do, you’re ahead of me. Not without a surreptitous under-table Google, anyway. And I’m still in two minds about the esi ewu. But in terms of an overdue education, a couple of Read More
I love watching a chef work the tandoor. It’s something about the calm, economical movements, I think: the minimal fuss. You appreciate their efficiency, especially knowing, from limited experience, how ferociously hot those ovens are; and how reaching in and slapping the dough-laden gaddi ‘pillow’ against the sides- and getting it to stick- is harder Read More
Who doesn’t love a good Mediterranean grill house? There’s something refreshing about the lack of pretension and the unshowy consistency. The local default is City Road, where there’s a cluster of good ones, but this is another dispatch from the Canton food mile. If you’re planning on a takeaway, you wait at tables in the Read More
Matsudai’s is a very modern success story: it has been well rehearsed elsewhere, but ultimately it’s a tale of resilience, from owner James Chant’s refreshing willingness to talk about his mental health as his original impetus, to reimagining the business in the face of global trials. Clare Road in Grangetown sees this former bank repurposed Read More
Scuffed tabletops and vinyl banquettes: it’s basic in here. No designer has preened over this interior. It’s certainly Pakistani, rather than another of the typical Bangladeshi-run kitchens which are synonymous with ‘Indian’. There’s a clue in the wall-mounted picture of the Bab-e-Khyber (‘Khyber Gate’), built in 1964 to facilitate trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan. A mixed Read More
After dinner at Hadramowt, I went back for lunch the next day. I find it useful to visit a restaurant twice if I’m going to write about it: that might not be what everyone does, but it seems fair. It’s less about being the first to get my hot take online, desperate for those all- Read More