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Sometimes it takes a couple of native Londoners to really get lost in the middle of town. I think it is mostly lazy presumptuousness - of course I know where I’m going, or at least my fellow urbanite will do – coupled with a little plain laziness.
And that is exactly what happened a couple of weeks ago when I partook in a charming internet experiment entitled ‘Where’s my Pork Chop?’.
WMPC, as it is affectionately known, is the brainchild of fellow blogger Dan, the FoodUrchin, where he gets other bloggers to make extra of their dinner to exchange with him for goodies from his allotment or suchlike. Wednesday was my turn, which is why I found myself up bright and early wandering around the South Bank with some speed but little direction.
We were looking for Canteen, a fairly new eatery on the South Bank that neither of us had tried before – I was to give Dan his dinner in exchange for my breakfast (apparently things had been a little slow on the allotment recently, ‘things’ were mentioned but ‘people’ may have been more precise…).
In the end we resorted to using the iPhone AND asking, but really it was just sheer perseverance that got us to our destination – ok, ok, I know it wasn’t quite like reaching the summit of Everest, but we still felt a little heart leap when we spotted the place.
Anyway, having now done our officially recognised amount of exercise for the day (there are a lot of steps on the South Bank), we felt we had worked up a well deserved appetite.
And so to breakfast.
It’s funny, I never used to be much of a morning person, and some might say still am not, but having breakfast with a virtual stranger was actually a lot of fun. It helped immensely that the company was charming and that we had just tons to chat about, food, food photography (thanks for the white balance tip Dan, it has made a real difference), food blogging – can you tell there is a common theme here…
The coffee at Canteen was good and strong too, which may have added a certain power to the talk. However, unfortunately for Dan, his bacon, eggs and hash browns weren’t quite as good as my eggs Florentine, which were pretty tremendous – perfectly cooked eggs on vibrant spinach smothered in a deliciously lemony hollandaise.
The place is arranged in cute old fashioned canteen booths each with their own little lamp, think 1960s Britain rather than 1950s America, but reworked in a very modern style, it certainly has a charm to it. The menu is very best of British, breakfast is a big feature, as are puddings and pies. Given its handy location (behind the Festival Hall, for any others who may be searching), excellent eggs and my penchant for booth dining I’ll certainly be going again.
After the breakfast we did ‘the exchange’ and I handed over a portion of that old favourite, sausage and butter bean casserole, with a little Hackney grown salad and French dressing on the side.
Regular readers will have noticed I have posted about this dish before, it’s a great one, using fennel seeds to create an unusual savoury flavour. It is the only time I really use these seeds, I should do it more, they really are tasty… Anyway, I digress, below is the recipe for this very simple but very tasty supper, make it yourself I guarantee it will be a firm family favourite in no time. The FoodUrchin certainly seemed to like it, high praise indeed!
PS If you’d like to get involved in WMPC drop Dan a line, he’d love to hear from you. Getting your dinner cooked for you by another food lover, what’s not to like!
Ingredients
(ever so slightly adapted) from Nigel Slater in the Observer
1 medium onion
2 large cloves garlic
1 tablespoon fennel seeds
2 bay leaves
5 sausages
500g passata
2 tablespoons wholegrain mustard
2 tbsp olive oil
1 can butter beans (plus a half/small can if you can find it, no biggie if not)
Serves 2-3
1 Peel onion, cut in half, then into 6 or so thick segments
2 Warm a 10cm pool of olive oil in a heavy bottomed pan, add onions and cook for 3-4 minutes
3 Add fennel seeds, bay leaf and garlic (crush or chop) and sausages, brown lightly all over
4 Add passata and 1 tablespoon mustard, bring to boil and then put in drained and rinsed butter beans and S&P
5 Simmer for 20-25 minutes (I usually like to chop sausages up into 3 pieces after about 10 minutes - just to be sure they cook through)
6 Stir in last tablespoon of mustard and serve with a bit of green salad, a hunk of bread and a spicy wine.
Tags: Canteen, Eggs Florentine, FoodUrchin, WMPC
Right, a couple of things:
I was not lost, I was merely disorienated in the morning breeze.
I let you think that you chose the better option at breakfast but my bacon and eggs really was much much better than yours.
And I tell you it is definitely “things” that are responsible for the lack of activity on the allotment, the slowness of “people” has nothing to do with it, no sireee, nadda, nope, no way.
But other than that I had a great time at breakfast,we should do it again! Great sausages!
; )