Entertainment For Lively Minds
Greasy Spoons
I've always been a lover of greasy spoon cafes. It's something I've inherited from my father, who throughout his life has supported traditional cafes. As a consequence, he has sometimes been unable to finish mother's tea, due to his indulgences in cafes.
Whenever I visit a city, I try to boldy go to those greasy spoons I haven't ventured to before.During my last few trips to London, I've frequented Cafe Rios in Soho, although I would welcome any tips for other good London cafes. Most of the time, when I'm away from home, I tend to skip the Hotel breakfast and head out to look for a local traditional cafes.
Here in Scarborough, a favourite is North Bay Cafe; reasonably priced and their chips are always crisp, dry and light to the bite. MOJOS music cafe in Scarborough is another favorite, although one couldn't really class it as a greasy spoon in the traditional sense.Legend has it, that it is haunted by a ghost, a former chef, who sometimes returns from the afterlife to chop veg!
I would be interested to hear from fellow greasy spoon lovers amongst the massive and your menu favourites. We don't all like Starbucks and Prats De Manger (or whatever it's called do we?) And Costa, does Costa you an arm and a leg for a cup of coffee. But fair enough if you do like the chains, each to their own.
There's nothing better than a good greasy spoon is there? Just watch out for those white sausages and luke warm beans on the all day breakfast and cinnamon teacakes.
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I love a good greasy spoon, my local one is fab
Bet you can't guess what my preferred dish is...
Stop it, please
The biggest downside to living abroad is the lack of access to a quality fry-up.
It's all bread rolls, cold meat and cheese over here.
I don't eat breakfast anymore...
so I no longer frequent greasy spoons. But I used to. Oh yes. Before I moved to Oxford I was already well-acquainted with one legendary place in the city, the St Giles Cafe. At the age of 19 or so I would come up to visit a couple of friends at the university and we'd go there on a Sunday morning to deal with our raging hangovers. From memory, this is what a full English consisted of:
3 sausages
5 rashers of bacon
2 fried eggs
small mountain of baked beans
small hillock of fried mushrooms
4 slices of fried bread
All for about £3. Hangovers were duly cured, but instead we spent the rest of the day feeling like we'd put on four stone.
Cafe Crowther
Fewer cafes seem to be doing fried bread anymore, which is I guess a good thing and I can't remember the last time I has some!
I hope your Oxford mushrooms were fresh and not tinned, but I guess for a £3 breakfast, probably not!
Apart from holidays and the odd weekend, my breakfast most mornings is either porridge or one banana, exciting stuff. Fried breakfasts every day can soon become tiresome.
St Giles...
...went just the once, the morning after a wedding. Bloody hell, it was an almighty plate of food. There's also some good spots for fry ups in the Covered Market I think - what's the name of the greasy spoon at the far end, Patrick?
Me and the missus did once have a fry up in here:
It's been painted bright colours now - at least it was a couple of months back the last time we were in Northwich.
I would welcome any tips for other good London cafes:
http://russelldavies.typepad.com/eggbaconchipsandbeans/
this is a good site too
http://www.classiccafes.co.uk/
Cheers
Thanks to you both for those links, they will be very useful.
when i worked in London
i used to look forward to a trip the New Piccadilly Cafe. I guess it wasn't really a 'greasy spoon' in the strictest of senses, but it came close enough. It was like stepping into a time capsule; you'd pop in on a saturday afternoon, it'd be pissing rain outside, you'd sit down, order from the menu (with - even in 2002 - an 01 prefix on the phone number) and just drink in the atmosphere, and relish the egg and chips which was on its way.
The New Piccadilly
It closed in 2007. I used to eat there every week and was one of the last customers. Everybody wanted the fixtures and fittings as souvenirs but the owner - bless him - decided to junk the lot, so there'd be no evidence left of its fifty years in the business. I even had my job interview for The Word at the Piccadilly.
Nice photo feature here.
I was a regular too
Still miss the apple crumble...
The hope workers cafe
On holloway road, used to use it every saturday and Sunday morning when earning a few quid working on a site at the weekends. Used to love the fried egg rolls!
Still there, and still had the faded Pepsi sign as far as I remember.
Still serving
I was there on Saturday.
MOJO's Music Cafe is a favourite?
I'd have kept that quiet if I were you.
Belchers?
Blimey, I lived opposite that caff (I think) for a couple of years, it's in Brighton yes?
The Abergeldie, Shudehill, Manchester
Imagine a mock tudor cafe. Now imagine the beams are painted red, not black. Now imagine the best fry up in Manchester, on the fringes of the "Northern Quarter" (retch), a hop and a skip away from the Hare and Hounds, the best pub in Manchester. Throw in the Observer and you've just imagined every hungover Sunday morning of when I lived in a flat in the city centre.
My dad always said...
... you can tell a good greasy spoon by the enameled mug they serve tea in.
Andy's, Southport
Home-made meat pie, proper chips and beans and maybe a home-made custard tart & passable cup of coffee - I can't tell you exactly what his price is but you'd have change from £6 for all of that. (Apparently the tea is excellent but I don't do tea)
Several times I've tried to get in on a Saturday but it's always rammed full.
Andy's also make their own mince pies and they are the best I've ever bought.
The Three Trees Cafe in Withington.
Known to one and all as the Cafe Des Trois Arbres. Classic. You read only tabloids. Everyone smoked. A large mug of tea would be automatically provided. The breakfasts were herculean. It was run by two ladies of a certain age who were slightly disaproving of the students who went in there but also rather liked it because they were very motherly and got very pleased when they watched a bunch of big strapping (and very hungover) lads getting outside of enormous platefuls of their finest fried comestibles.
Cafe FM
And as with most cafes,through the mist of fag smoke I expect you could hear a radio tuned to a classic gold type station, in crackly medium wave.
I used to frequent a cafe on the top floor of the Merrion Centre in Leeds which did a great fry up and was always playing classic hits od old. I fear it may have gone now.
Maggie's, Lewisham
Not been there for a few years (live in Oz now) but that place is an institution. According to the website, they still do the four pound fifty as much as you can eat breakfast. Marvellous..
http://www.maggiesrestaurant.co.uk/
Next time you're in that London...
make sure you get yourself on the outside of a breakfast at The Regency Cafe. It's a national treasure and has been used as a film location too.
http://www.handtomouthblog.com/local-hero-15-the-regency-cafe/
Cheers
Thanks for that, I will certainly have a look.
The Cock Tavern, Smithfields
Magnificent artery clogging feasts and will serve you a big steak bloody and rare and a pint of beer at 6am too - if that's your bent
Fox and Anchor nearby
Now relaunched but this favourite also sourcing its meat products from Smithfield market used to serve man sized portions with a pint of Guinness to set you up for your 11am snooze.
can vouch for both those Smithfield spots
although F & A has gone a bit posh now. Also avoid The Cock if Rangers are playing a big game - unless you are a devout McBlue.
Also, good in a slighly more modern fashion in the area is Smiths (John Torode's place) and there is a really good old school caff on The Old Bailey/ St Barts side of the square whose name escapes me
That would be Beppe's on the Old Bailey side
another fine old Italian run establishment thankfully swimming against the incessant tide of awful Starbucks and Costas. Try to visit, they need our support.
The Olympic Coffee House in Leeds
On Boar Lane near the Corn Exchange, ... is worth a visit. But don't call it a greasy spoon to the owner. Nice pie and peas.
The Regency Cafe
Off the Horseferry Road, London.
I used to go there for the occasional lunch with friends when a lowly Admin Officer at the FCO in the '90's.
It was in there I managed to make someone snort baked beans down their nostrils when the pastie I was eating accompanied by chips was a little tough. 'I think I must have ordered the pastie 'al dente'' I said.
I've always been proud of that pun.
Not sure if it's still there but it certainly was when later used as a location for a scene in 'Layer Cake' where the informer is brutally beaten and hot tea poured over him. That would never happen in my day.
*EDIT: Just seen Lard's earlier post. It's still there. Hurray.*
There was a place I used
to frequent in Brighton a few years back - forget the name - near Brighton railway station that served a Gutbuster; an oval platter with just about everything, all for £3. It was the perfect end to a night's boozing. When I was a student - many moons ago - there was the Northways Cafe, near the Hendon campus of Middlesex Polytechnic, a regular lunchtime haunt. If I recall, two steak & kidney puds, choice of three vegetables and bread and butter - about 80p. God knows how I managed that lot and keep awake for the afternoon, these days a cheese sandwich and a cup of tea would finish me off.
The Market Diner, Brighton
Not really near the station, but just outside the (now defunct) fruit market which is why it was open late nights/early mornings only.
Its still there, the home of the famous Gutbuster. Not £3 now though.
http://www.marketdinerbrighton.co.uk/
Grindleford Station Caff
(In)famous amongst the climbing/biking/walking community in The Peak. Sadly the hilariously curmudgeonly owner has passed away, but his spirit lives on in the many signs around the premises. And in the 'No mushrooms!' policy. Check the comments below this review:
http://russelldavies.typepad.com/eggbaconchipsandbeans/2004/07/grindlefo...
One of a kind.
In there at the weekend
Glorious day and it's the perfect stop for a round walk up Padley Gorge and along Stanage to Curbar and back.
The old fella may have died but his spirit lives on. My favourite sign by the counter;
"We only make one customer happy per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow never comes. Deal with it.".
A while back there was a post about "Britishness" -
- well, this discussion is a perfect example!
Alpino caff, Chapel market Islington, a few years ago now ...
Overheard a certain Mr Hepworth pitching an idea for a new music magazine. Always wondered what became of that!!
E. Pellicci ...
... on Bethnal Green Road. After the closure of the much missed New Piccadilly on Denmark Street this has got to be the best cafe in London. Worth a special trip.
http://www.timeout.com/london/restaurants/venue/2:1001/e-pellicci
Planet Mondo
http://planetmondo.blogspot.com/2011/03/food-week-londons-most-classic-c...
Mr Mondo only just wrote about that last week.
Seconded
Pellicci's cafe in Bethnal Green is well worth a visit. It's not so much a greasy spoon as a proper old-fashioned Italian caff, of the type that were once plentiful in London, and a gem in an otherwise grim area.
That would be Beppe's
another fine old Italian run establishment thankfully swimming against the incessant tide of awful Starbucks and Costas. Try to visit, they need our support.
Hall of the Mountain Grill
Did anyone here ever go there?
Mountain Grill?
I think you'll find Leslie West has his own table by the door.
(Escapes through window clutching coat)
Apart from Dave Brock, you mean?
I bet it was a vegetrian place. Which did "interesting" brownies.
Cafe Cherubini
Great Western Road, Glasgow
Best sausages I have ever eaten.
As I am in Glasgow this weekend I fully intend eating some.
Scarborough cafés
I see Mojos has moved from its previous location, it always appealed hugely with its combination of caffeine, cake and CDs and is a compulsory stopping place for the Clefs.
I was hugely disappointed to see the 20s style Corner Café at the North Bay demolished to make way for the 'apartment block', but that's progress for you.
The North Bay café is more your traditional caff and ideal to dash into to escape the elements.
But which is the best fish and chip shop in Scarborough? If not the UK? I feel a whole new thread coming on.
My Grandad used to take me
My Grandad used to take me to the Corner Café as a youngster, I have memories of eating NICE biscuits there, whilst my brother ran havoc under the tables.
Scarborough is quite poor re fish and chip shops, I’m allergic to fish, but the chips and fish (I’m told) are usually okay from Capplemans off Northway and Seamer Chip shop on the outskirts. You should start a fish and chips thread!
Pie and Mash
Thanks for the shout Simon, perhaps off-topic, but I've also been on a buzz for Pie and Mash lately - taste test and scores on the doings here..
http://planetmondo.blogspot.com/2011/03/food-week-pie-mash-and-liquor.ht...
http://planetmondo.blogspot.com/2011/03/pie-in-this-guy.html
Terror
As well as "The Breakfast Of Justice" rumour has it that MOJOS in Scarborough now does a special under the counter "Breakfast Of Terror".