Tinie Tempah on Old Kent Road

Nice to see Tinie Tempah talking up the Old Kent Road in the Guardian at the weekend:

'Life is good when you're Tinie Tempah. The Plumstead-raised artist – otherwise known as Patrick Chukwuemeka Okogwu Jr – has won a tonne of praise for uniting the disparate music scenes of grime, underground rave and radio-friendly pop without selling any of them out. He's had two No 1 singles, a No 1 album and two Brit awards. One of the fringe benefits of fame is that you get to discover new experiences in eating. Born in London to Nigerian parents, Tinie has always appreciated his food.

Nigerian food is a fundamental part of his life. It's what he grew up with and it builds up the palate because it's packed with flavour. "Nigerian food is lots of flavour, lots of tomato purée, rice, yam, beans… it's a whole load of stuff, really good." His favourite would be pounded yam with egusi soup, a savoury soup with meat and spinach which exists in countless variants across West Africa.

He has a couple of favourite Nigerian restaurants, both on the Old Kent Road in south-east London: the classy 805 and the more home-style Presidential Suya Grill. They're both family-run businesses, friendly and personal. Presidential, in particular, is one of those places where you feel like you're in Nigeria, he says. "There is a real nice atmosphere. When I come back from travelling the world, I do like to go there and chill. It's humbling."

Vege Breakfast at McLarens

The search for the perfect vegetarian breakfast is a lifelong quest. For me there are a number of essential agreements - eggs, mushrooms (not tinned), some kind of vegetarian sausage/bacon and some kind of potato product (such as hash browns. Price is also a factor - it should be roughly equivalent to the cost of meaty fry up in a local cafe (i.e. not restaurant prices).

For many years my favourite was the breakfast at Domali, the excellent vegetarian cafe in Crystal Palace. But now it has been pushed into second place by the breakfast at McLarens Bar and Grill in Honor Oak Park.The vege breakfast there includes scrambled egg, tarragon sausage, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, potato wedges, beans and four slices of toast. Extra points for having a home made sausage rather than using a supermarket bought one and for offering (without being asked) an extra sausage when I said I didn't want beans. Extra extra points for running over the road to buy a new bottle of tabasco when they realized that the bottle I'd asked for was empty. All this for £4.45.

Lots of other good food on the menu including vegetarian dishes but it may be a while before I get beyond the breakfast.

(evidently I am not the only one who thinks so - see this analysis of the breakfast)
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Cafe Crema this month

Various events at Cafe Crema this month...

Thursday film nights: Feb 26th - Like Water for Chocolate; March 5th - Bergman's Wild Strawberries (£6 includes film plus polenta or homemade cake and a glass of wine...Arrive at 7.30 for food; film starts at 8.15)

Music nights: Thursday 19th Feb - 'London's finest rocksteady/ska band, The Delegators (£6); Friday 20th Feb - Cafe Crema piano jam...'New Orleans New Cross. Bring your banjoes, trombones, ukuleles, tambourines and voices. Piano's just been re-tuned and is now at concert pitch' (free); Saturday 28th Feb -The Woodsmen 'jiving country-noir hillbilly blues' (£6)

Cafe Crema, 306 New Cross Road London SE14 6AF. 2mins from New x Gate tube and mainline. Easy on buses. mob 07905 961 876/ 07905 552 571.

Electric Elephant

The Walworth Road is fine for egg and chips (and you can chat to Frankie Fraser while you're eating them should you so wish), but it's not great for coffee. But now just off the Walworth you can get decent coffee, not to mention some reasonably priced fresh sandwiches and pastries, at the new Electric Elephant cafe. It's at 186a Crampton Street, open from 7:30 to 5:oo pm, Monday to Friday, 10 am to 3 pm on Saturday. If you go on a Thursday or Friday afternoon you could combine it with perusing the radical literature at 56a Info Shop and picking up some bargain veg at the Fareshares Food Co-op, also both on Crampton Street.

Cafe Crema in January

Cafe Crema are restarting their Thursday night film and food sessions this week.

On January 8th at 8 pm they are showing Babette's Feast, a movie that will certainly get your appetitite going - luckily the £6 entrance fee includes homemade brownies/carrot cake and polenta or a glass of wine.

On Saturday 10th January at 8 pm, Cafe Crema is hosting a benefit for Medical Aid for Palestians featuring the 'lazt mulled wine blues' of Tina Pinder with 'Fine quality songs from this velvet-and-gravel voiced guitarist/pianist'. £4 admission.

Cafe Crema is at 306 New Cross Road, London Se14 6AF (079o5 961 876/ 07905 552 571).

Brockley Christmas Fair

Don't forget tomorrow (Saturday), it's the Brockely Christmas Street Market. Coulgate Street (next to Brockley Station) will be pedestrianised for the day, and there will be stalls selling Christmas gifts from 12 noon to 6 pm, plus live music. Brockley Ukulele Group are playing at around 3 pm - Santa will also be singing , and children and parents from John Stainer Primary School. Not sure who else, but there's definitely more! There will be a Santa's grotto and lantern making for kids, minced pies and malled wine and the Xmas lights will be turned on by actor Patrick Baladi - best known as Neil in The Office, who can forget that dance?

Chai's Garden

New Cross's newest blog comes courtesy of my favourite local Thai Restaurant - Chai's Garden on the corner of Kitto Road/Gellatly Road. The restaurant is behind Skehans Free House, but this is no 'Thai food in a pub outfit'- the restaurant is in its own space in a converted coach house behind the pub. If you haven't got time to sit in, they also have a good takeaway menu (now with a 10% reduction). There's not too much at the blog as yet, but it includes the menu, directions, photos and the intriguing story that the noodle dish Pad Thai was actively promoted by the government in the 1930s as part of a Thai nationalist effort to steer people away from Chinese culinary influence.

Café Crema Autumn Nights

Coming up at Café Crema in New Cross, a new series of Thursday film nights. Tickets (£6) include the film plus 'either a hot main meal or a glass of wine and some very nice home made cake like proper rice pudding and cream or sticky chocolate brownies'

Romantic moves set in France seems to be the theme for the next couple of weeks. Tomorrow (Thurs 2nd Oct.) its Amelie, next week (Thurs 9th Oct) Chocolat. Doors open 7.30, films start at 8.

They are also going to be part of the Latin American Film Festival with screenings on Sat Nov 15th and Sun 16th.

... and on Nov 22nd there's music with Tragic Roundabout - 'Punky-ragtime clarinet/accordion/banjo-led festival favourites. With tables and chairs cleared away for dancing this night will be a cracker'. 8.30 til late, tickets: £6, fully licensed.

Café Crema is at 306 New Cross Road, London Se14 6AF. 2mins from New x Gate tube and mainline. Easy on buses. …mob 079o5 961 876/ 07905 552 571. See also www.cafecremaevents.co.uk for information. You can also book the venue your own private film nights/gigs etc.

Dulwich Wood House

I was about to make a delayed post about finding a pub with a decent garden in South East London, recommending a trip to The Dulwich Wood House at 39 Sydenham Hill. It is very close to the entrance to Sydenham Hill Woods on Crescent Wood Road and is therefore ideal for a drink after walking the dog in the woods, as we did a few weeks ago. I was going to say that the pub managed to combine being a nice traditional pub feel rooted in the local area (with old newspaper clippings about the Crystal Palace on the wall), while offering what looked like a decent menu (albeit it a bit pricey and I didn't actually try the food). I was going to sing the praises of the bucolic garden overlooked by a veranda.

But then checking the details at Beer in the Evening I found that it is actually closed for refurbishment, with rumours of the restaurant being extended (presumably farewell to the veranda), the bar modernised and dogs being banned! Well I guess we'll have to wait and see what its like when the works finished - it will still be a pub in a great location with a decent garden. But let's hope it doesn't lose its pub character entirely, and let's hope too that they at least allow dogs in the garden - do they want to lose the 'just walked the dog in the woods and need a pint and something to eat' market (actually they probably do).

New Cross Pub News

There is a 'For Sale' sign up on the White Hart Inn in New Cross. The landlord has come in for a lot of local criticism after his ill-judged attempt to turn the place into a lap dancing club, but as we've said before it would be a great loss if there was no longer a pub in this key location on the junction of Queens Road and New Cross Road. Still with the Hatcham Liberal Club still unsold and falling into disrepair just round the corner, you wonder who's going to buy it. If I won the lottery I'd probably take them both and turn them into utopian palaces of drink, food, dancing and sociability, but that doesn't seem too likely.

Meanwhile there is a lot of building work going on at the former Earl of Derby in Dennetts Road, with an extension downstairs and a function room upstairs. The whole exterior of the building has been painted so somebody's making a real effort, which is great as I feared this was going to be another vanishing pub replaced with housing. Not sure exactly what's planned, but the owners are Remarkable Restaurants Ltd who refurbished the George and Dragon in Acton, which has had good reviews - so expect food as well as drink.

Deptford in Vogue

The Standard reports that in the new Vogue magazine's "Don't Miss" list, 'The best café slot is dedicated to The Deptford Project, a traditional British café housed in a converted Sixties railway carriage. It sits in the old railway yard at Deptford Station and is the centrepiece of an attempt to brighten up the high street. It includes a lavatory in a shed done up as a shrine to Elvis and a weekend creative industries market.'

I haven't actually tracked down the original Vogue article yet, but will be scouring the magazine racks tomorrow.

The Deptford Project

Deptford Properly, the short lived cafe on Tanners Hill, is seemingly closed for good. Apparently there was some kind of dispute with the landlord, and a flooding problem. On the plus side the new Deptford Project cafe has now been open for a few weeks at 121 Deptford High Street. It is a converted railway carriage, and their website features a short film about how they got it here.

There's a terrace outside where you can sit outside reading their stock of glossy art/fashion magazines while you eat/drink. Coffee was good, and I am led to believe that the toilets are a treat in the own right (I didn't have cause to visit when I was there but my partner reported there was some kind of Elvis theme).

Sunday in Rotherhithe

Rotherhithe might not be top of your list of destinations on a sunny Sunday, but we had a good time there today. We started off with the car boot sale at the Fisher F.C. football ground in Salter Road. It's on every Sunday from 11 am and replaces the one that used to be held at Alwyn Girls School in Bermondsey. Nearby on Rotherhithe Street is the Old Salt Quay pub/restaurant, a great place to sit outside by the river and watch the boats and the world go by. All within walking distance of Canada Water station if you're not cycling or driving.

Deptford Properly

Finally made it down to Deptford Properly cafe in Tanners Hill on Saturday. They immediately scored top points as they were playing Belle and Sebastian's 'The Boy with the Arab Strap' when I went in. Then I sat outside in the sun with a pot of tea - real tea leaves and only £1.30 - and a very nice chocolate cake.

They also had lots of quirky and interesting books to read - I had time to read some short pieces by Jorge Louis Borges before going on my way. Yes indeed something for your mind, your body and your soul. I believe it's open Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, 10 am - 7 pm and Sunday 11 am - 7 pm. I will be returning.

Refreshments

I cannot contemplate going for a wander without plotting where to stop off for refreshments en route. My current favourite is Brocca in Brockley (directly opposite Brockley station), where I've got in the bad habit of making myself late for work by having a 'quick' breakfast treat. As well as very reasonably priced coffee and cakes they have a small library of books you can borrow.

Saturday mornings sometimes find me in the Laban centre in Deptford Creekside. The cafe there is right next to the Creek, depending on where you sit you can have a good view of the river, and of course you will be sitting in one of the most interesting new buildings in London. It's run by Feast Your Eyes ('the ethical catering co-operative') and you don't have to have anything to do with the dance classes to enjoy its food and drink. Anybody can pop into the cafe in the daytime Monday to Saturday.

End of an Tasty Era

Many eras have ended recently, the John Peel era, the Arthur Miller era and, more happily, the "Doctor Who not being on" era.

Another sad one hit me last night when, tired and uninspired, I rang the Raj Bhojan for my dinner. After dithering over two of the veggie Balti's, the fruit, lemon juice and nut Nobrathon Balti Whala and the chick-peas in spicy sauce Kubli Balti Whala I settled on the zingy delights on the former.

Dinner arrived, along with two more onion bhaji's than I'd paid for and a complementary bottle of Cobra and the chirpy delivery chap handed me, as casual as anything "Our new menu".

And gone was the Nobrathon Balti Whala, gone the Kubli Balti Whala, gone too were the other veggie Balti's I never, in my lack of foresight, got to try. Not potato balti, alas, no cheese balti. The change was immediate. What should have been a tasty treat of a Nobrathon was an passable vegetable curry. Luckily we’d gone for side orders and the saag bhaji was up to its usual standards.

I am thinking of handing in my Raj Bhojan 25% eating in discount card in protest. I need tasty curry and I need it as near as possible. Ideally within lunging distance of a decent pub, I need suggests, my fellow Transpontinians and I need them before my next curry craving comes. Otherwise, this could escalate to a level the like of which hasn’t been seen since Chinese Takeaway to the gods Uncle Wrinkle close for a few months.

Help.