Thursday 19 July 2012

Spice of Life, Blackheath

This could be a perfect local Indian restaurant. Spice of Life is an unassuming looking place on Lee High Road but gets understandably packed most nights of the week. 
The interior has quite the 80s flavour, from the carpets to the booths - the napkins are even in those cool fan shapes. As we sat down we were descended upon by chutneys and papads and dutifully tried to determine which chutney would blow our heads off, a bit of "Indian Roulette" if you will. Pleasingly none of them were too vicious and it was a perfect start to the meal.
Now, the rest of the food. Allow me to assist you if you're in here from a Thursday to a Sunday. You'll be given a menu, by all means give it a scan. Take a look. Have a read. Then, put it down, wait for the owner, Moody to come on over and tell you what's on their special offer instead. It's £10pp for a starter, main dish and side dish with rice or bread. Thankfully I was with a regular who informed me that this was the drill. We each ordered something different from the choices on the special menu and split it fiddy fiddy. 
Here's what we got:
This is the onion bhaji, pretty standard but nice and crispy - not like those crap ones that are all batter and taste like sponges. And it came with a nice dollop of imli. On the right is some tandoori chicken wing nice and charred, seems to have been cooked in a proper tandoor. 
Curry everyone! The left is a beef curry, a little odd for an Indian place but the beef was so tender and soft we didn't ask any questions. On the right is a spicy prawn curry - sadly with weeny prawns instead of nice huge ones but the sauces itself they were both cooked in were great. 
  
I've been sick of visiting Indian restaurants in the area and being given curries full of cream (korma), chillies (vindaloo) or heinz tomato soup (tikka masala), often without even a whiff of real spice. Spice of Life does things properly though - you could both see and taste the cooking that went into the dishes.
amazing
This was easily enough rice for two people but we also got a huge bit of naan bread that I didn't manage to get a photo of as we pretty much ripped it up as soon as it was put in front of us.
The sides were good, on the left is some Aloo Saag, which was lovely and soft, the right is some cooked swede in cumin. That's the great thing about the Special menu, though choices are fairly limited, it changes frequently and is often more experimental than your bog standard curry house.
  
With pretty decent specials also running on their drinks (we shared a nice bottle of red for a tenner) you chumps have no excuse to not go. There I said it. Not sure about the stuff on the rest of the menu is like but I am confident I shall be returning for a CHA-party or two so I will keep you most dutifully informed!
 
Spice of Life
260 Lee High Road
Lewisham
London
SE13 5PL
  
Tel. 0208 244 4770
  
Opening Times
Mon: 18:00 - 22:00
Tues: Closed
Wed-Thurs: 18:00 - 23:00
Fri-Sat: 18:00 - 23:30
Sun: 18:00 - 23:00

Monday 2 July 2012

Stockmkt Night Market, Bermondsey

Holding an outdoor night market was always gonna be risky. Rain. Wind. Pigeon excrement. But thankfully last Thursday the heavens didn't open, and the pigeons held it in, for Stockmkt, a travelling night market - this time round in Bermondsey Square. It mainly focusses on street food from around the globe but other knick knacks including jewellery, vintage clothes and crafts were on offer AND there was a cool DJ. People were calling it Little Glastonbury. Drunk people. Anyway, the food was the real star of the show, here's the lowdown on some of the stuff we sampled:
This is takoyaki from the guys at Pom Pom Takoyaki. I first had it not long ago at Curry Ono in Brixton, but they had 3 different types this time - a traditional octopus one, a pea and potato, and chicken teriyaki. I insisted we keep things authentic and get some octopus. They were lovely if a smidge tricky to eat in the ladylike fashion I am so accustomed to. 
This is a rather dapper looking chap from Kamm & Sons, makers of a new ginseng spirit. It's also made using grapefruit peel, echinacea, manuka honey and goji berries - how exotic! (they're based in Clapham). It sounded suspiciously like a health food but it didn't take much persuading for us to try a couple. We had a lychee cocktail and one with bitter lemon. It tastes quite similar to gin and both cocktails were splendiferous. Thank you, dapper man.
We visited Indian street food outlet Horn OK Please, who were selling dosas, thin South Indian pancakes usually made from rice flour, filled with a mildly spiced potato mix and traditionally served with a fresh coconut chutney and a thin lentil daal. Usually they look like this but these ones were made with lentil flour instead, so the pancakes were much thicker in consistency:
Their version of bhel puri was great, a crunchy, soft, sweet and tangy indian snack made from chickpeas, crunchy sev, yoghurt, a little red onion and most importantly an imli chutney, a thin, sort-of dressing - made from sour tamarind and sweetened with dates or brown sugar. HOP added pomegranate seeds to their bhel which was cool, lovely bursts of sweetness. Sadly I didn't get a pic but below is my friend's b-e-a-ut serving of chickpea chaat, the best veggie dinner one could hope for.
Really quite full by this point, we made a Ginseng spirit-induced decision to visit Fleisch Mob for some sausage action. Look out for them, they show up all over South London - Brockley Market, Brixton Market and other foodie festivals that pitch up over the summer. 
We settled on sharing the hot dog with a sausage that had Emmental cheese running through the middle. Because sausages need to be that little more suggestive. It was great, and as good as you'd get in Austria or Germany, the proper curry sauces and ketchups were there to go with it and everything. 
We had zero space left for the sweet treats on offer, but did manage try a sample of the cupcakes from Chai Cupcakes which were amazing, and were tempted by the shakes at Retro Shakes via Yummy Boutiqueone of my friends had the CANDYFLOSS milkshake which sounds like a match made in Heaven. And then sicked up from Heaven later. 
   
All in all a brilliant evening, and judging by the size of the crowds there, Stockmkt will definitely be back. See you there.
   
Stockmkt
http://www.thestockmkt.com/