Attendant

I would like to state for the record that it's not a regular occurrence for me to spend time in a men's toilet - and somehow particularly not at a urinal - but that's exactly where I recently passed a very pleasant half hour, so to speak. What's more, I took some friends.

Fear not gentle reader, this may be underground but it is completely above board. For those not in the know, may I present to you -  Attendant? Attendant is a wonderful, tiny, very quirky coffee bar located in what used to be a Victorian men's toilet in Foley Street, signposted by the gorgeous original cast iron surround and a sandwich board with the obligatory coffee drinkers' thought for the day. 

Steps lead down into a classic white-tiled interior (don't worry folks, the entire thing was scrupulously steam-cleaned as part of the renovation) with many of the original features intact: the cisterns became light-fittings, the urinals are now booth-like tables with stools (insert your own toilet joke here) and there is even a hand-drier on the wall. 

Happily, it is not all style over substance. It may be novelty that first brings you to Attendant, but the coffee will keep you coming back. Proper baristas who know their stuff - and who, on my visit, were the loveliest guys ever despite being run off their feet - with Caravan coffee, Paul A Young hot chocolate and a selection of good food. We had literally just eaten lunch but did manage to cram in a mini salted caramel brownie with our drinks, and I recommend you do the same. They even made me an affogato (an espresso with a scoop of ice cream) which is one of my favourite things. 

So go for the random photo opportunities but don't rush the coffee; it's actually worth the visit all by itself. Add your personal tag to the graffiti board at the door (mine is there if you look carefully!) but be aware of one somewhat ironic factor; the only thing they don't have is a loo.

Yours, sipping espresso in subterranean sanitary splendour,

Girl About Town xx

Coco Nail Bar

Lately I've taken to treating friends to a day out in London rather than buying presents for birthdays and special occasions; most of us would be hard pushed to remember what a particular friend bought us for our last birthday, but an experience tends to be much more memorable, and doesn't gather dust in their flat. Plus I get an excuse to spend a day in my favourite place with one of my favourite people: what's not to like?

I was horrified to learn that this particular friend - let's call her Sarah, largely because that's her name - had never been to Portobello Road market. Faithful readers know of course that I have (see my blog post in October last year) but I am always very happy to go back and it happened to tie in nicely with somewhere I had been planning to try that seemed perfect for a day of girlie pampering and chat.

Coco Nail Bar is on Portobello Road itself, near the bottom of the hill just before the Westway. As most people sensibly start from the Notting Hill end and walk downhill this meant we could peruse almost all the market first and finish with a well-earned sit down. All my friend knew was that I was treating her to a pedicure; what lifts Coco out of the ordinary are the unexpected and seriously cool extras.

Massage chairs: Coco has those huge massage chairs you get in high end hairdressers and airport lounges, so you can get unknotted and de-stressed whilst getting fabulous nails.

Minx nails: I am a recent convert to these, particularly over the summer. Funky pre-printed and/or metallic designs are gently heated under a lamp and then applied to your nails, whether natural, gel or acrylic. Celebrity favourites, I love them because everybody notices them, you don't have to worry about drying time and they last for absolute ages - four to six weeks for a pedicure. Or you can go for standard OPI polish, obvs.

Still not impressed? Okay, how about . . .

Sushi: Coco have teamed up with another of my favourite places, Ukai (another blog post from October 2012) to provide absolutely delicious sushi in situ. We had just pigged out at the wonderful Books for Cooks, or this would have had to be done.

Scented candles: heaven forbid you should have to sit in a place that smells of street market and nail polish. Ancienne Ambiance candles provide a gently fragrant background to your pampering - and if you love them, you can buy them at reception.

Apple TV: watch the big screen, or the individual tablets mean you can watch catch-up TV, update your Ocado order or listen to your own choice of music. We didn't bother, because we were very happy with . .

The DJ: Saturdays see their resident DJ setting the scene with old school R&B and dance tunes - perfect for chilling out whilst being pampered. All that's missing from this picture is a glass of wine or an ice-cold margarita. Lucky, then, that they have a . . .

Cocktail bar: Seriously. Wimp out with freshly-made Illy coffee if you must, but we shunned the coffee, wine and bubbly for cocktails - classic margaritas and mojitos and Coco signature cocktails Nailed It, White Coco and Peach Bum. Now that's what I call a proper girlie day out. Happy birthday honey!

Yours, pampered, polished and feeling no pain,

Girl About Town xx

The V&A Café

The V&A Café looks like any other museum or gallery café at first glance; brightly lit, bustling staff clearing trays, signposted stations for hot or cold food, coffee or cakes - and all heavingly busy. A modern, functional place to take the weight off and fortify yourself with tea and cake before venturing back out into the world's greatest museum of art and design (their words, but does any other venue even come close?). Now take a look at the suite of three interlinked rooms off to the side and it's like stepping back in time; together these rooms make up the world's very first museum restaurant and it is a seriously impressive setting.

The Refreshment Rooms at the Victoria and Albert Museum were intended as a showcase for contemporary design and craftsmanship and are a wonderfully Victorian mix of the ornate and the practical. The main central section is the Gamble Room, designed by James Gamble, Godfrey Sykes and Reuben Townroe. Originally the main doors to this room were directly opposite the museum entrance so this would have been the first room visitors saw; even by Victorian standards this must have seemed imposingly grand. Look more closely; the ceiling is enamelled iron and both the walls and the huge columns are completely covered with ceramic tiles, making this most majestic and opulent of dining rooms completely washable and practically fireproof.

Mottoes espousing the joys of food and drink adorn the beautiful stained glass windows and the frieze is a quotation from Ecclesiastes II:24: 'There is nothing better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and make his soul enjoy the good of his labour.' Hard to argue with that.

The Morris Room (the Green Dining Room) was the first major commission for William Morris's company Morris Marshall and Faulkner. The dado panels based on signs of the zodiac were painted by Edward Burne-Jones, who also designed the stained glass windows. The influence of William Morris and his pattern-making is most recognisable in the plasterwork leaves and flowers on the walls (although if you are a Morris fan, the rest of the museum has plenty to offer). This room, although beautiful, has a more restrained, quiet feel.

The Poynter room (the Grill Room) designed by Edward Poynter has a homely cosiness to it, with blue Dutch tiles and wooden panelling. The large tiled panels of the months and seasons were actually painted by students from the ladies' tile-painting class at the Schools of Design; this was very much in keeping with V&A Founding Director Henry Cole's  radical idea of involving students and the public in creating this public space. Giving such an important commission to female students would have caused quite a stir in Victorian times.

The beautiful iron stove where a chef in whites would have grilled steaks and chops to order is still in place; the V&A website has sample menus from 1867 - both first and second class - which include options such as jugged hare for 1/6 (i.e. one shilling and sixpence, or 18p) or, from the second class menu, stewed rabbit for 10d (ten pence). That may sound like a bargain until you consider that an unskilled labourer's wage was about a pound a week.
http://www.vam.ac.uk

Nowadays the catering side is handled by Benugo, so expect freshly-prepared basics and great cakes (although as everything is made fresh on the day, quality and availability can inevitably dip if you arrive too near closing time). I hear the cream tea is good, so that's my next visit sorted.

Yours, scratching the surface of London history just for you,

Girl About Town xx

Portobello Road Market

Portobello Road Market is actually a series of markets stretching over half a mile from Notting Hill Gate tube station to just past Ladbroke Grove; I usually take several leisurely hours to cover this allowing for dodging the crowds, browsing and the odd purchase, plus a pit stop or two for refuelling.

You can start at either end but as it's on a hill most people seem to start from Notting Hill and walk down, and on manically busy Saturdays when the antique market is in town it can be easier to just go with the flow.
Assuming you have picked a Saturday to visit, follow the crowds out of the station past the chocolate-box mews houses (look out for George Orwell's blue plaque) and you're straight into the antiques section of the market, which goes from Chepstow Villas to Elgin Crescent - you can download a useful map here: http://www.portobelloroad.co.uk/getting_there.asp

Serious antique hunters should arrive by 9am latest (NOT 5.30am as some guide books say - none of the traders will be there!) but for those of us who are just there to soak up the atmosphere and idly browse, the market doesn't start closing up until around 4pm so it's a perfect lunchtime destination. Also, don't neglect the arcades off to the left; there are plenty of goodies to be had in there as well as from the stalls.

You can pick up some incredible bargains here. I don't necessarily mean investment pieces (although I'm sure that's possible), more just beautiful, characterful touches for your home that would cost a fortune in a designer shop. I love hunting around for mismatched silver cutlery and I have a friend who has gradually collected a set of gorgeous old fine china cups, saucers and tea plates, all in different patterns and styles, which look truly fabulous together and give simple tea and cake a real frisson of glamour. Amongst the silverware, glass and china there are lots of other wonderfully quirky collectables: antique printers' trays and blocks, metal advertising signs, worn leather footballs and wonderful old tins in all shapes and sizes - the old-fashioned food ones like Homepride, Oxo and Tetley make great kitchen storage!

After Elgin Crescent this segues into a food market which on Saturdays covers not only standard fruit and veg but also artisanal breads, cakes and baked goods, olives, flavoured oils, chutneys and relishes etc. If you happen to be here around packing-up time (just after 4pm) the traders are often keen to offload the fresh produce, so you can grab yourself some cut-price treats to take home. This area also offers a wide range of freshly-cooked street food, perfect for a quick energising pick-me-up before heading off down the hill.

The next section of the market, from Talbot Road to the Westway, is more like a standard weekend market with a range of new goods. Quality can vary enormously from stall to stall and you will find everything from 'original' art, jewellery, scarves and rugs to clothes pegs, batteries and watches. Keep an eye out for the regular shops as well though, as Portobello Road is home to some fabulous independent retailers; the rather wonderful Street Sensation website offers you a virtual shop-by-shop walkthrough map here:
http://www.streetsensation.co.uk/ptbello/pb_intro.htm

Look out particularly for the Oxfam Bookshop (172 Portobello Road) - if you are a bibliophile like me, declutter your shelves and drop your preloved  books here, then browse their shop and take home a whole new selection, all for charity. If I lived nearer, this would pretty much be my library. Also well worth a visit is Books for Cooks (4 Blenheim Crescent), which is an unbeatable combo of eclectic cookery book shop and working test kitchen/cafe. As soon as you open the door a waft of baking lures you inside and soon you're sampling the very recipe you're looking at on the page. Genius. They also run workshops on making everything from pasta to sushi upstairs in their demo kitchen - check their website for details:
http://www.booksforcooks.com/

Another fabulous coffee stop is newcomer Casa Nova (140 Portobello Road), which promises 'chocolate and something more'. It delivers on both counts; my coffee was really good, gutsy with a nutty depth that really hit the spot, and arrived with some freshly-baked biscuits drizzled with chocolate. There was an extensive choice of cakes and pastries to go with, as well as a range of delicious hand-made chocolate. For those with a real sweet tooth or in need of comfort, you must try the hot chocolate. It is literally that - like drinking warm melted chocolate, an oddly Willy Wonka-esque experience but highly recommended.

As you near the Westway you start to get into the fashion market. This is a great place to pick up vintage clothing, bags and accessories as well as hand-made pieces from young designers, usually fashion and textile design students; worth it to know you're unlikely to turn up at a party in the same outfit as someone else, and fabulous bragging rights if they were to make it big! Some stalls have a theme, maybe military or evening wear, whereas others are just a treasure chest jumble.

At this time of year it is worth checking out this season's fashion for coats and then rummaging through the racks; basic shapes like the peacoat or riding jacket don't change and you can find a bang on-trend winter coat or two for a fraction of the high street price. The best stuff is under the Westway; the market does continue on and into Golbourne Road but it degenerates into car boot type second hand goods past Cambridge Gardens.

Obviously the market is a tourist attraction but Portobello Road is fundamentally a working market for Londoners and a great Saturday afternoon out; I haven't managed a trip there yet without leaving laden down with fabulous finds. Go, enjoy.

Yours, vintage clad,

Girl About Town xx

Kaffeine

Have you ever stopped to think about how huge the difference in quality can be when you're looking at life's most basic food and drink options? I mean, picture an economy-brand sliced white loaf from your local supermarket; open the thin plastic wrapper and the bread inside is generic, flabby, pale and characterless with no discernible flavour at all. Now imagine an artisan loaf fresh from a real bakery; wrapped in paper, still warm, with a rich yeasty smell, crisp golden crust and a deliciously soft and yielding centre . . . mmmmm. That kind of bread is worth eating on its own - with some unsalted butter perhaps, or gutsy green olive oil and balsamic vinegar. The supermarket stuff is really only useful to stop the inside of a sandwich from becoming the outside.

It's the same thing with coffee. You're standing at a vending machine; you put in your coins, a squat little plastic cup drops into a holder, and a nondescript murky brown liquid is dispensed into it. It could be coffee with milk (as the code you punched in promised), it could be school canteen gravy, it could be puddle water. You take a sip; the temperature pretty much rules out the latter, the rest is guesswork. Or you could head over to Kaffeine in Great Titchfield Street and beg for sanctuary, and an Americano. Rich, smooth, almost chocolatey in its intensity and with enough of a kick to get you right through the day, this is coffee as it should be; done properly, an affordable everyday luxury.

Kaffeine is an Australian/New Zealand-owned independent cafe and takes its coffee, and its food, very seriously. I stopped in on my way back from grabbing lunch so I haven't eaten here yet, although I want to. Salads, sandwiches and pastries all looked fresh and delicious as they were wafted past me to one or other of the cool crowd that seem to make up the Kaffeine clientele. It does have a very relaxed vibe: exposed brickwork, wooden benches, great music and friendly, laid-back staff. It's exactly the kind of place you'd like to hang out in on a rainy afternoon with your laptop, although it is so popular that you'd probably get guilted out by the queue before you were really ready to leave.

My gift to you, my fellow coffee addicts. Because we deserve the best.





Yours, suitably caffeinated,
Girl About Town xx

Cabaret Mechanical Theatre

If you were one of those kids who used to fight with your brother or sister about whose turn it was to push the button for the green man when crossing the road, then you're going to love this exhibition.

This was pure nostalgia for me. These automata used to be downstairs at Covent Garden where, being fun and free, they were an intrinsic part of a teenage day out along with buying hand made silver earrings from students at the market and hanging out by the street performers before filling up on cheap and fabulous veggie stir fry at Food for Thought.

If you're making a special journey, be aware that the selection here is quite small; the exhibition space is basically the size of a shop and you'll be here fifteen to twenty minutes tops. However, size isn't everything. These wonderful and ingenious contraptions are great fun and guaranteed to raise a smile; there is something about pressing the buttons and making them whizz into action, be it rowing pirates, kissing couples or a lion-tamer retrieving his head from the lion's mouth just before the jaws clamp shut, that is very satisfying in a toddleresque kind of way.

I can't decide if my personal favourite is the man eating spaghetti from his bathtub or the waving Queen, but I marvel at the imagination and workmanship in them all.

I didn't have time on this particular visit. but if you are trekking out to the area, Dulwich Picture Gallery is a short bus ride away and is on my hit list, so watch this space. There are plenty of places to grab a bite or a caffeine fix in the nearby High Street, which incidentally has some very nice charity shops worth browsing for a pre-loved bargain or two.

One word of warning; I nearly pitched up at the Kennington branch of Space Station 65, which doesn't have an exhibition on at the moment, having glanced at their website and just seen a tube station within walking distance. This exhibition is in the East Dulwich site - check their website for details.

http://www.spacestationsixtyfive.com/

Delightful, amusing and free. What more do you want? Go push some buttons.

Yours, making things happen,

Girl About Town xx

Ice-cream worth shouting about

It's a scorchingly hot English summer's day (What?? A girl can dream . . . ) and your public transport advisory bottle of water just isn't cutting it. You need real refreshment - and fast.

As a self-confessed foodie, I like to seek out the most carefully-sourced, freshly-made, high quality dishes available and am always intrigued when respected tradition is gilded with an imaginative, contemporary gleam. Sadly, such ambitions are frequently more than my purse strings can bear - until of course we start talking gelato.

Ice-cream is relatively cheap, which makes top-quality gelato eminently affordable. One of the many advantages of London's vibrant multiculturalism is that we have experts in all manner of culinary disciplines, armed with traditions and skills learned at their grandmothers' aprons in regions across the world, all a short stroll or a few tube stops away.  Here are a few of my favourite gelateria and why I think you might want to give them a try.


Gelupo   http://www.gelupo.com/
Sister restaurant Bocca di Lupo's hot young chef Jacob Kennedy delivers traditional smooth gelato in some innovative flavours - think ricotta, chocolate and black pepper.


Gelatorino   http://www.gelatorino.com/

Recipes from an award-winning Turin gelato master and top-quality ingredients. Try the Breakfast in Turin coffee/chocolate chip flavour in an Affogato with espresso - the perfect pick-me-up.


Oddono's   http://www.oddonos.com/
One of the first to bring real Italian gelato to London and still going strong - flavours vary all the time and I know I should try something other than the pistachio, but it's just so darn good. Apparently Gordon Ramsay is a fan, and I'm  not about to disagree.

Scoop   http://www.scoopgelato.com/

Now with a new store on the Old Brompton Road, Scoop are hosting a Signatures special over the weekend 14th-16th September (see their website for details). Go along, and see what ordinary ice-creams want to be when they grow up.

Chin Chin Laboratorists   http://www.chinchinlabs.com/
Okay, I confess, this one is not about Italian heritage but pure showmanship - although the ice-cream is surprisingly good (especially the chocolate) and the special flavours can be imaginative, it's really all about the liquid nitrogen. Ice-cream making as a spectator sport anyone?

See - you can be cool and sweet at the same time.





Yours, with sympathy for the brain-freeze,

Girl About Town xx

Coffee in all weathers and secret gems

Greetings, fellow about-towners!

My two favourite places to stop for coffee (or a glass of something chilled and bubbly) on the Southbank; the question is - sunshine or rain?

Sunshine? It has to be the rooftop garden, landscaped by the Eden Project and perched on top of the Queen Elizabeth Hall. The dismal 'summer' has at least meant that this garden is wild and fabulous, with lawns, rampaging flowers and even a scarecrow; sit at one of the tiny herb-bedecked tables facing the greenery for a ten-minute escape from the bustle, or grab a bench for an impressive view across the river.

http://www.companyofcooks.com/locations/our-locations/southbank-centre


Rain? Avoid the homicidal umbrella-wielding throng and scurry into the BFI. Wend your way through to the cafe/bar/lounge area and you'll find a welcoming boho mismatch of sofas, armchairs and long low tables; slouching is pretty much compulsory. Excellent coffee, free wi-fi, and it's great in the evenings too - behind the bookcase is a hidden entrance to their new cocktail bar, the Drawing Room. All bookshelves, leather Chesterfields and dim lighting, it's a little like suddenly finding yourself on a film set; appropriate, no?

http://www.benugobarandkitchen.com/about-bak

Enjoy,

Girl About Town xx