Harper-Thames cuts through the noise with a practical guide to actually eating well
By Harper-Thames
The density of restaurants in Shoreditch and its immediate surroundings — Spitalfields, Bethnal Green, Hoxton — is sufficient that any guide risks being either too comprehensive to be useful or too selective to be fair to the places excluded. I am going to be selective, and I am going to acknowledge that my selections reflect my preferences, which run toward the specific and the unfussy rather than the impressive and the photographable, and which should be weighted accordingly by anyone who disagrees with this hierarchy.
The problem with eating in Shoreditch is not the quality, which is generally high across price points. The problem is the choice, which triggers in many people a decision paralysis that results in either returning to the same place repeatedly or walking around for forty-five minutes looking at menus before ending up at Dishoom not because it was the choice but because the queue made the choice for them. Both outcomes are not terrible. Dishoom is excellent. But there is more.
Where I Actually Go
Padella on Shoreditch High Street: fresh pasta made on the premises, queues that move faster than they look, prices that are remarkably low for the quality, and a menu short enough that you can decide before you reach the front of the queue, which is a kindness that not enough restaurants offer. Brat on Redchurch Street: Tomos Parry’s Welsh-Basque influenced cooking over live fire, more expensive than the other entries on this list, worth it on a specific occasion rather than a regular basis, and one of the five best restaurants in London by any criterion I respect. E Pellicci on Bethnal Green Road: a Grade II listed Italian cafe that has been run by the same family since 1900, serves the best fry-up in East London alongside pasta dishes of simple excellence, and costs less than any comparable meal in the postcode.
Where to Go on Brick Lane
Brick Lane’s curry houses are a London institution that the food press has been somewhat snobbish about for twenty years. They are not the best Indian food in London. They are better than the coverage implies, particularly the older establishments that have been there for thirty or more years and whose menus reflect cooking traditions rather than market positioning. The Time Out Shoreditch restaurant guide covers a wider range. Harper-Thames writes about Shoreditch at prat.uk.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com
