The Full Monty

In its previous incarnation, Monty’s could be found in the railway arches on Southwark’s Druid Street. An auspicious location as it also heralded the end of the Bermondsey Beer Mile (or the beginning, if you like to mix it up a bit). Making it the perfect pit stop for pre-drinking ballast or post-drinking refuelling.

Although I was more than a little sad to see it move, a successful Kickstarter project funded the hop across the river to a much swisher - if less accessible from my endz - location on Hoxton Street earlier in the year. Happily meaning those Jewish deli staple cravings can now be satiated all-week round. 

Originally an East End bakery, interior-wise, it’s hard to fault. Everything just screams out joyful, in a lower East-side, preserved in aspic kind of way. From the pickle-shaped refreshment sign to the bagels strung up in edible necklaces. There’s a slick and shiny zinc counter, hedged by handsome leather stools; Victorian tiled booths with numbered globe lamps; and a black and white harlequin chequered floor.

While you may not be able to enjoy a locally brewed beer in the sunshine with your sandwich as you could at the old gaff, the drinks menu here goes someway to making up for it - offering beers from Wiper and True , Siren and Thornbridge, spirits including kosher scotch and Serbian plum brandy and even Kiddush sacramental wine. As does the bigger food menu including Friday Shabbat suppers of roast chicken and lokshen pudding and a range of home-baked babka, blintzes and bagels.

It wouldn't be a brunch without a bloody mary (as we were eating at 15.00, some people may argue it wasn't brunch anyway) and this was a pretty good one. Poky with horseradish and chilli and garnished with a huge celery stalk that made me feel a little less guilty for missing my green juice earlier that morning as I chomped my way through it.

Latkes are a hugely underrated potato preparation. Perhaps it's because they are normally served with apple sauce or sour cream - or, if you're lucky, like here, both - but to my mind they are far superior to the common garden hash brown. These were no different - light, crisp, greaseless and quickly dispatched.

Chicken soup with matzo balls and noodles - aka Jewish penicillin – was as soothing and restorative as the names suggests. There’s something supremely comforting about a well-made chicken soup; the slight crunch of the carrot discs; the fragrant fronds of dill; the bland matzo balls and noodles soaking up the shimmering broth.

And while on this particular Sunday afternoon, I was feeling mercifully hangover free (although the bloody marys were staring to take care of that), this would also have made the perfect panacea on those desperate occasions where only a T4 marathon on the sofa and several pints of Berocca are going to cut it.

The Rueben special dispenses for the need to choose between salt beef or pastrami, as you get a heap of both. This is a Very Good Thing, as you get the perfect balance between fatty salt beef and the leaner, peppery pastrami. Sauerkraut, mustard and Russian dressing add piquancy; all barely held together by toasted rye bread and accompanied by half a new green pickle.

Despite their being no blintzes on the brunch menu - and being out of chocolate babka when we arrived - Monty’s is still a Jewish gem. And if you’re still craving an after-brunch snifter, you could do a lot worse than the nearby Old Fointain pub, where a pint of strawberry wit beer from BBN, one of Bermondsey’s finest, made the perfect summer pudding.

Hot town, summer in the city

A hot summer in the city is one of my favourite things. Of course, like everything in life, there are caveats - being pressed into an armpit on the Northern line in rush hour, or walking around Soho on bin day have their own special olfactory charm – but, overall, there is a special excitement to the heat haze and sticky asphalt; the dead streets; and getting a frozen strawberry lemonade form the McDonald’s in Walworth Road (if they’re not cleaning the machines, again) on the way back to Stealth’s after a big night out.

Eating on occasions like these demands a laid-back approach. Sure, you can enjoy the icy blast of air-conditioning somewhere identikit, but far better to be gently sweating somewhere with the door propped open; a redundant fan in the corner, blowing the hot air about; and simple food washed down with a cooling libation or two. All of which boxes Patogh, just off the Edgware road successfully ticks.

Sitting by the window meant a cooling breeze, and a fascinating view down to the kaleidoscope of one of London's most vibrant thoroughfares, but I did feel sympathy for the guys working behind the blazing grills and charcoal oven. Especially as I suspect they were more than twelve hours in to their fast for Ramadan.

It isn't licenced, but you can bring your own alcohol. As we'd had a few poky #trainbeers on the way there, I stuck to the sparkling water while the Ewing had her favourite, doogh. A divisive (the thought gives me the dry heaves) thin yoghurt drink with added salt and mint, it proved an ideal way for her to temper the heat.

Mixed starters brought a platter featuring shairazi salad (chopped tomatoes, cucumber, onion and parsley); two tangy yoghurts, one with shallot and one with cucumber; and creamy houmous topped with a thicket of fresh herbs. 

Although it wasn't advertised, they also bought us a dish of mixed pickled veg that were very similar to the jars of 'Nanny pickle' my grandmother made. We all used to fight over the green tomatoes when I was growing up, and the Ewing and I were soon locked in a nostalgic battle for the best bits.

To scoop up our dips we also ordered the big special bread, which has got to be one of the best, and most accurately, named dishes in town. What turns up is indeed big and made of bread, and its pretty special too. Cooked in their own clay oven, it's at turns crusty and chewy and pillowy with a wonderful smoky, nutty flavour from the charred spots and the sesame seeds scattered on top.

Chelo khoresh ghaimah was a stew of split yellow peas, diced lamb and dried lime; slow cooked in a tomato sauce with 'potato cubs' and topped with crisp-like potato matchsticks. I'm not normally a big fan of a stew, especially when stewing in the heat, but here the meat was gently yielding, the sauce deep and rich and glossy, and the spiky sour edge from the citrus made it perfect for the weather.

Chelow Kebab - the Iranian national dish of steamed saffron rice topped with skewered meat - come in the choice of two meats; lamb or chicken, and two varieties; kofte and shish; or you can go wild and have a mixture of the two. I chose the lamb kofte, served with a suggestion of salad and with more saffron rice - topped with a pleasing large lump of butter. This, with a good squirt of their homemade chilli sauce, is kebab perfection. And you don't even have to be pissed. 

Fabulous, fast food, friendly service and, at thirty quid for the lot, great value anywhere - not just in this frenetic corner of town. All making Patogh a great option, come rain or shine.

I can tell you my love for you will still be strong

After the boys of summer have gone

The art of compromise - bank holiday beer special

Sometimes, I think the key to happiness is mastering the art of compromise (although, at others, I'm pretty sure it's all about eating cold pizza in my dressing gown). For instance, the Ewing loves reclaimed furniture - or anything made out of an old pallet - I love pizza and both of us have a healthy interest in beer. Which made the Crate Brewery, which prominently features all three of the above, a particularly appealing choice for the Bank Holiday, while also giving us an extra day to get over the hangover.

It also happens to be in Hackney Wick and the overground rail closures, coupled with the bank holiday bus replacement service, meant we pretty much needed the extra twenty four hours to get back home again.

Situated in the White Building on the River Lea Navigation  - a canalised river running from rural Hertfordshire to the River Thames at Bow Creek - the bar is the perfect spot for a few beers in the sunshine. The waterfront location also means visits from The Record Deck, a working barge that also sells vinyl, that the Ewing was very pleased to see moored up and already spinning tunes as we arrived.

The bar at Crate is a masterclass in recycling. Old railway sleepers, cleverly cobbled together from local artists' cast-offs, make up the bar; ladders and ratchet straps make indoor seats, rusty bed springs have been fashioned into eccentric light fittings and the canal-side benches and tables are made from scaffold planks - even the spare off-cuts of wood have been used to make planters for a herb garden. Across the yard they have a brew-shed, where they make the beers. In other words, the Ewing's paradise.

To start I tried the Crate Pale ale, both in bottle and on keg; the latter was cleaner and crisper, but also less aromatic and not as interesting. A very nice beer, either way, and at 4.5 percent, perfect for a session in the sun. The Ewing also went for something steady to start with in the Sour, a fantastically vibrant beer infused with a touch of passionfruit and hibiscus while retaining the power to make you grimace slightly on sipping that a good sour should.

They specialise in wood-fired pizza - more specifically crisp, Roman style pizza, rather than softer Neapolitan style. While it’s significantly easier to eat, lacking the somewhat soupy centre of a southern Italian pie, a roman base does bring to mind a giant Carr’s water cracker. As a biscuit to eat with a lump of cheese, that’s probably a good thing - they were always my dad’s favourite when I was growing up -  but as a vehicle for melted cheese, I prefer something a little less friable.

That said, my favourite ever pizza was eaten in Rome - a Bianca pie, topped with courgette flowers, anchovy and mozzarella - cooked by a tiny guy who resembled John Paul II, and thereafter nicknamed ‘Pizza Pope’for the rest of our trip.

The toppings here are pretty outré. You can stick to cheese or meat if you like, although the prosciutto and salami were off on our visit, but they also offer walnut and sweet potato, banana and dahl (even the Ewing wasn't sure), and, our choice, Middle Eastern lamb with pine nuts, spinach and mint.

The crisp base and the ovine topping made it a close cousin to the lamachun - although canalside it will set you back twelve quid, as opposed to the three quid of Green Lanes. Commendably, certainly at that price, they hadn’t skimped on the toppings and a more robust crust meant that they held up well. It also went very well with two halves of their keg stout and the cask porter.

Billed as the UK's first dedicated tank bar, that's the fermenting vessel rather than a military vehicle, our next stop, Howling Hops, was just around the corner. Of course their too hip for signage, so look for the crowds drinking from dimpled schooners outside if the weather's nice, or the scribbled note on the side door if it isn't.

Originally, they started brewing in the basement of the Cock Tavern, on nearby Mare Street, and selling their beers in the bar above. But soon thirsty East Londoners meant demand had outstripped their capacity and a bigger site was sought. This one mixes bar and brewery, allowing you to drink the freshest beer straight from the source, while giving them the capacity to bottle some of their beers for distribution, too.

I started with their Running Beer brown ale, before moving on to the Pale XX Superior No.1 and the IPA 2 West Coast Special. All good, the brown ale and IPA particularly. The Ewing stuck with the blonde beers; an Amber Dexter amber ale and the  East End Hefeweizen, brewed in collaboration with Pressure Drop. The latter reconfirming my dislike of wheat beers while being my wife's favourite of the trip.

The food is provided by Billy Smokes, with a range of smoked, fried and fermented goods, including the Big Fuck Off Tray of Meat (an array of protein including glazed ham hock, sausages, beef and lamb belly) available. Our visit saw a more restrained selection, with a small selection of wraps and buns and a handful of sides on offer.

My sausage bun, a chunky disc of homemade smoked sausage made with the Running beer, was served on a shiny brioche bun and came topped with a smattering of citrus slaw and house bbq sauce. All the classic components done well, this made a handsome (second) lunch.

The beer can chicken roll was more divisive. The Ewing loved it (it was sublime, believe me - TE), and she is a connoisseur in chicken sandwiches, but I found it hard to see it as much more than a sarnie. Yes, it was a commendably good sarnie piled with juicy chicken, which at seven quid it should have been, but was lacking much in the way of promised BBQ flavour and made me think wistfully about crispy smoked thighs and smoky, charred wings.

One thing we did agree on was the pickles, a snappy little selection of cucumbers, carrot, peppers and green beans (a very underestimated pickling vegetable) that made me want to go home and crack open the Sarsons and make some of my own. (There’s a solid preserving pedigree in my lineage, with our family being the lucky recipients of several jars of legendary Nanny Pickle each year until my Nan recently hung up her apron).

Predictably, just as were leaving Howling Hops, the Bank Holiday heavens opened - which threatened to make the ride on the number 30, all the way from Hackney Wick to Marble Arch, feel like a very long one; especially after the last round of beers. 

But nabbing a spot 'driving the bus' and gaining Prince for company - we picked up his eponymous 1979 vinyl album from the record barge moored by Crate (a compromise that meant the Ewing letting me wail along to 'I Wanna Be Your Lover' at ear-splitting levels if she could get a new record player) meant the promise of some slow jams could make even the slow crawl home enjoyable.

Shotgun BBQ

Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it's not going to be fired, it shouldn't be hanging there.

Anton Chekov

It all started out East with doughnuts. Not just any doughnuts; puffy, generously stuffed orbs, freshly baked by Brad Mcdonald and his wife Molly sold outside their yellow front door on Hackney’s Columbia Road Market on Sundays. The next step was to move West to Marylebone to open the much lauded, American South inspired Lockhart. Now the Mcdonalds have branched out again to Carnaby, with Shotgun BBQ, a homage to the low and slow.

The lunchtime menu starts with a selection of snacks to share, followed by a selection of that British staple, the sandwich, each with a little Southern twist. There is also a selection of regularly changing smoked meats, sold by weight or as a combo plate. The latter to which you can add a glass of wine or Four Pure beer for just an extra couple of quid.

'Cheese and chive dip' came with some, rather frightening looking, shards of dehydrated cabbage stuck in the top like sails on a haunted pirate ship. The cabbage was inspired, but sadly too brittle to scoop up the pleasingly old school creamy mixture in which they were embedded with much success. Of course, the Ewing was happy to improvise with a digit. (Is what they are made for - TE)

The smoked meat plate was a simple joy and surprisingly substantial. The pork belly was good (isn’t it always), especially when doused in a little KC hot sauce, but the brisket really stole the show. The red-rimmed strips of beef bringing to mind all the barbecue superlatives; smoky; juicy and, err, meaty; that I hoped they would.

The ox tongue bun with oyster mayo and a heap of melting onions was halved and then pretty much inhaled. Yes, if you're trying to find fault, some may find the potato bun rather on the sweet side (southerners sure love their sugar), and the briny note of the oysters became lost in the background, but for me the slippery, smoky mix of allium and offal - nicely spiked with a punch of pickled cucumber - made the perfect sarnie. 

More sweetness came with sides of fondant sweet potato (clue’s in the name, really) that had been topped with crunchy pecans and lashings of butter, and some decent barbecue beans, made with baby pintos and topped with sesame seeds. Coleslaw was a little wan in comparison, but I perked it up with a good squirt of the house made Carolina mustard sauce.

Having spent far too many hours of my life staring at sites like Roadfood, the home made Nana pudding – a southern trifle-like classic layered with chopped bananas, cream, custard and Nabisco wafers (like a kind of round sponge finger), was the only dessert for me. Looks wise it didn’t disappoint, being served tableside from a huge glass dish that put me in mind of Blur’s ‘There’s No Other Way’ video, but set in Charleston not Colchester. Taste wise it was also on the money, as evidenced by my wife snaffling her pudding then ‘helping’ me finish it

Happily for Chekov, we squared the circle by going back to where this story started; with a doughnut. Again, not just any doughnut, this one being a limited edition 'pineapple delight' - the ten available when we visited rapidly being chalked off on the specials board during our meal, much to the Ewing's consternation. And a delight it was, the crisp fritter-like surface pock-marked with fruit-filled craters and glazed with icing. Definitely worth the suspense.

Bites: Gone to the Dogs

When I was younger my parent's used to tell us the story of their honeymoon - taken at the holiday park in Ilfracombe, Devon - where the newly married couple pressed their noses against the glass of a restaurant in town and dreamt of coming back and eating all the fancy seafood dishes they couldn't afford. By the time me and my sister were born the family finances were much improved, but this bittersweet and touching tale remained a favourite. 

Which brings me to David Ramsey's the Dogs - recently opened on our first visit, now a doyenne of the stripped back food scene - where I stood outside with the Ewing exactly six years ago - not quite penniless, but certainly rather financially constrained - and dreamt of going inside for dinner. (While, ironically, the Dogs may be known for their value grub, our diet on that trip mostly consisted of stocking up on unseemly amounts of hotel buffet breakfast followed by scotch pies and snowball cakes.)

But, as Gabrielle sung, dreams can come true; so after a long and slightly soggy day in Auld Reekie, a change of socks and forty winks, I was looking forward to a few beers and a menu that 'champions Scottish and British ingredients, in dishes that will comfort and excite'.

Staying with the Scots ale trail theme we both chose Williams Bros beers; Grozet a gooseberry-infused wheat ale, for me and the Fraoch heather ale for the Ewing. The latter was particularly interesting, being based on the Gaelic recipe for 'leann fraoich' (heather ale) - purportedly the oldest style ale in the world - with it's peaty, malty notes.

Perfectly pan fried hake, sat atop a pile of cockles and mussels in a creamy, dill-flecked broth bobbing with chunks of potatoes and turnips, was as lovely as it's list of ingredients suggested - the only thing missing being a hunk of crusty bread to mop up every last drop.

The 'venison, sausage casserole and barley' was a gratifyingly simple affair. The deer had been slow cooked to a sticky sweetness alongside winter veg and while the Scots have a penchant for beef sausages - one of the only things the Ewing is not keen on (the other being me singing 'Saturday Love') - this was served with a pork snag and a big mound of fluffy, spiced barley to soak up all the gravy.

Side orders of honey roasted carrots and in-house pickled cucumbers hit the spot, the zingy cukes being a surprisingly good match with both the venison and creamy fish broth. In an attempt to eat as much of the menu as possible, we also asked for roast spuds with bacon, although were probably rather relieved the order didn't make it to the kitchen.

The Ewing's green apple trifle was a sight out of the seventies, with it's wonderfully bright swirling layers and crisp bruleed top. Despite the lurid appearance and the slightly incongruous choice of filling (an apple never strikes me as a particularly 'trifle-able' sort of fruit) this was great fun.

Toffee rice pudding, mined with chunks of honeycomb and dark chocolate, was as close to a hug in a dish as is possible. Add a wee dram of of Macallan 10 year fine oak and I was very glad I was on the inside looking out.