Last year, I had so much fun at the Soho Food Feast that I poured pimms over Angela Hartnett's feet. As you can imagine, I was thrilled to hear it was a two day event this time around.
The idea is that you exchange money for food tokens, a concept more popular here than in parliament, and a variety of Soho based restaurants cook little plates of food that cost one or two tokens each.
There were bars by the French House, the Duke of Wellington, Ceviche (pisco sours), Chipotle (margaritas) and Milk & Honey (gin based cocktails, £10, in a pint glass... this was all I could decipher before labelling it A Bad Idea for my personal wellbeing and running away). The whole event is a fundraiser for Soho Parish School, so the atmosphere is sort of 'kids and pissed parents' rather than anything grand. When we arrived on the first day, Sean Bean was standing incongruously on the makeshift, rickety stage, letting people know about the raffle. I still don't know why he was there but he stuck around for most of the day embodying the age old 'Northern tough guy/Classical thespian' dichotomy in a silent, charming manner. Heathcliff in Hull.
In no particular order, my favourite stalls over the two days:
10 Greek Street- crab with chili, asparagus, and salad. I'm a sucker for crab anyway, firmly on the crab's side in any crab v lobster debate amongst my friends (these almost never happen).
Polpo- ricotta, lemon, broad beans and asparagus on toast. They have this on their menu (or something very similar, I think this one had less mint)- a perfect, summery snack.
Quo Vadis- roast beef, horseradish and watercress in a bun. And handed to me by Jeremy Lee, which made it taste even better.
Pizza Pilgrims- Neapolitan fried pizza. Oh my gosh, this was incredible. How would YOU improve a freshly made mini pizza? Obviously by folding it in half, sealing up the sides and frying it. Clever. The queues became enormous.
Dstrkt- braised goat on pitta bread with watercress, garlic and chilli. This was so good it made me want to try Dstrkt immediately, despite its dodgy name and appearances on Made in Chelsea.
MEATMarket- mini cheeseburger.
Excellently impossible to eat. Ran rings around the GBK stand next door.
There was also something I've just written down as 'scallop' that I remember being delicious. I know, you don't need to thank me, I'm here to help.
