What the experts recommend
Nandine 45 Camberwell Church Street, London SE5 (nandineuk@gmail.com)
There’s a cheering backstory to Nandine, says Jay Rayner in The Observer. Pary Baban, the matriarch of the family behind it, fled her home in Iraqi Kurdistan in the 1980s when it was attacked by Saddam Hussein’s forces, and picked up recipes as she travelled from village to village. Settling in London, she and her husband started running newsagents in the 1990s. More recently, they opened a sandwich shop, and now they have their own small restaurant, which is “knocking out huge plates of big-flavoured Kurdish food at the sort of prices that restore your faith not just in eating out, but quite possibly in humanity in general”. On a Sunday lunchtime we devoured an “extremely diverting” plateful of mezze dips; a shakshuka of long-cooked tomatoes, onions and spices with baked eggs; a “trayful” of boldly spiced minced lamb kebab for just £12; and a tender and crisp chicken shish. And for pudding there was a stunning baklava, fragrant with dried rose petals. “Like everything here, first you look at it and sigh. Then you taste it, and sigh again.”
All dishes £4-£12. Pilgrim 46 Duke Street, Liverpool (07388-120098)
“Unless you’ve been asleep in a Wimpy for the past few years, you can’t have missed the burgeoning trend for food halls,” says Marina O’Loughlin in The Sunday Times. From Bristol to Glasgow, Britain is bursting with market-style hubs boasting lots of mini-restaurants – a phenomenon I love “because I’m curious and greedy”. In Liverpool, for example, the “fabulous” Duke Street Market has opened in a former warehouse, and the cracking Iberian-ish “flagship” restaurant Pilgrim is perched up on a mezzanine. On our visit, there were one or two culinary “hiccups” (wood-roasted quail that hadn’t been roasted for long enough; broad beans so big they were tricky to eat). But overall this place is a “blast”. We loved fatty suckling-pig croquetas with “electrifying” guindilla pepper sauce; mackerel
escabeche; and taut little Jersey royals blackened from their coal roasting and “squiggled with a sauce of Cabrales” (an Asturian blue cheese). And “St James tart” was terrific: an “insanely moist” almondy sponge with boozy cherries. “Praise be.”
Large meal for two, £116 including drinks.
Where to eat in West Sussex
To “escape the London madness”, my family heads to West Sussex, and in particular The Witterings, south of Chichester, says Nick Beardshaw, head chef of Kerridge’s Bar and Grill, in the FT. If you want breakfast out, go to Billy’s on the Beach in Bracklesham Bay for a full English, a Bloody Mary and coffee. “It’s a really buzzy place with a relaxed, friendly atmosphere.” Horrocks, a traditional grocery in East Wittering, is always worth a visit for its local seasonal fruit and veg, and I also stop by The Fisherman’s Hut to pick up the catch of the day for supper. “Get there early or it will have sold out.” On a sunny day, the Crown & Anchor at Dell Quay – overlooking Chichester Harbour – is the perfect spot for a softshell crab burger and a side of barbecue pulled pork chips. For an evening drink, we love The Anchor Bleu, an old-school, family-run pub in Bosham. “If you can get one of the two tables out front, you feel like you’re on the water, and the views across the harbour are glorious.”