101 YEARS OLD AND STILL STREETS AHEAD OF OTHERS...

STREETS have always troubled me and it has just got worse. Or better, depending how you look at it. The thing that has always bothered me is the way we speak when giving the names of roads or streets. When we say “Oxford Street” or “Bond Street”, we place the emphasis on the first words in the phrase, in this case “Oxford” and “Bond”, but if we are referring to “Old Kent Road” or “Euston Road” or “Northumberland Avenue” or “Park Lane” or “Trafalgar Square” we stress the words “Old Kent”, “Euston”, “Northumberland”, “Park” or “Trafalgar”. And this applies also to all other types of thoroughfare, whether they are on or off the Monopoly board, be they Hills, Walks, Crescents or whatever.

Last week, my problem with streets entered a new phase when I went to a new restaurant called Hankies in Marble Arch (with the stress, you will note, on “Arch”). Hankies, you see, which incidentally takes its name from the extremely thin Indian breads called Roomali Rotis which are hand-spun and folded hanky-like to accompany the “authentic Indian street food” they serve at the restaurant.

English streets, particularly in February, are not the same as Indian streets, but as I was eating it in the warmth of the restaurant, that was not the problem. Nor was I particularly worried by the possible difference between street food and road, hill, crescent, avenue or whatever food, though that has always been a niggling worry. No, my main concern this time was the inadequacy of the term “street food” itself, for the food served at Hankies was of a quality far superior to any street food I had sampled before. Quite apart from the spinach roomali (stuffed with spiced feta and roasted tomato), there was Crispy “Gold” Cod (with a sour mango dip), slow braised goat meat (with pickled hens’ eggs), Bhindi Bhel (which was crispy okra with sweet chutney, onions and rice puff) and a whole range of delicious sounding, and even more delicious tasting items at very reasonable prices. You can find more about Hankies at 61 Upper Berkeley Street in Marble Arch on the Internet at hankies.restaurant, and I am sure you will quickly agree that the street food they serve does not come from any old street. This is quite definitely Upper-Berkeley-Street-Food, which I now realise must be better than Oxford-Street-Food, Bond-Street-Food, and far, far superior to Any-Old-StreetFood, let alone Road-Food, Grove-Food, Mews-Food or Random-ThoroughfareAppelation-Food.

Yesterday, I mentioned certain things such as coronations and state funerals that the British do better than anywhere else on earth. Good Indian restaurants belong to that list too. The standard Indian take-away may serve everything with the same Indian restaurant sauce, but we now offer a range of top-class Indian restaurants that offer an unusual and outstanding choice of foods that I am sure are better than anything in Delhi.

Our streets may be dirty, polluted and clogged with traffic, but the street food can be superb.