I’ve just finished reading Craig Taylor’s book, Londoners. It’s really good. Like, really good. I can’t tell you enough how much I enjoyed it.
It’s a collection of conversations that Taylor has with people who live (or have lived) in this city - the people who love it, the people who hate it, the people who feel indifferent about it. He had a conversation with the woman whose voice tells you, “Please mind the gap”, and “The next stop is Great Portland Street.”
Many of the conversations Taylor had with people resonated: hard to find work, London’s endless energy and equally endless grey sky, the diversity of the people who live here. Many of the conversations were about experiences I’m privileged enough to know I will never have: living on the streets, sifting through rubbish bins to find food, abused for being a person of colour.
One conversation particularly struck me. It was with a guy who has lived in London all his life, and described these intense feelings of never being satisfied by the place, and therefore, deeply unhappy. The main cause of his dissatisfaction? Too much choice. Too many things to do, too many places to go, and not enough time to do or see them all. Too much choice in the supermarket. Too many things to spend his money on.
It did occur to me that he might change his mind if he spent a weekend in Palmerston North. But I guess his premise is that too much choice is unsatisfying, because you can never have it all.
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I don’t find too much choice unsatisfying.
I do find it overwhelming.
It is hard to reconcile with my impatient, needed to try that place or eat that dish yesterday, personality.
But I don’t find it unsatisfying.
It is the joy of being here. The constant choice is a game, a quest. A reason for adventure.
==
The choices here are stark contrasts.
In East London, trendy wine bars with small plates of boquerones and sourdough with butter, or 11 minutes down the road a smorgasbord of Indian and Bangladeshi curry houses and canteens on Brick Lane.
In Clerkenwell, gastro pubs or years old caffs serving eggs and sausages or family run Italian delicatessens. The riff on a Florentine trattoria that’s impossible to get into, or Fergus Henderson’s bone marrow and parsley salad on toast.
In Soho, cheap Chinese dim sum restaurants or franchisable Instagram spots.
Everywhere a Pret.
That’s only some of it.
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On Saturday I find myself in Shoreditch. After buying a bunch of forced rhubarb and a jar of bitter marmalade and two buckwheat shortbreads at Leila’s Shop, I find myself on Brick Lane.
First, I wander through the end of Brick Lane that’s full of overpriced second hand clothing and vinyl shops, beigel shops and cafes full of cool young things. I end up at the end of Brick Lane that appeals to me more - the end with South East Asian restaurants and canteens and the Masjid.
I go to Graam Bangla for lunch. I’m on my own. I’ve read about Graam Bangla - a Bangladeshi canteen that specialises in seafood and vegetarian dishes. It’s famous because Charles and Camilla visited once, while they were still Prince and Princess. There’s a cardboard cut out of Charles in military garb on a table just inside the front door.
I don’t understand much of the menu - it is language and dishes that are unfamiliar to me. But I’ve read enough online to know that the bhorta are good, and so is the fish ball curry. Still, I ask the young waitress what is good, what she’d recommend.
She tells me the fish ball curry is good, and so is the catfish. She tells me if I’d like, I can come with her and try some of the food to help me make up my mind.
I am naive to have thought that being led to sample the food would make the process of deciding what to eat any easier. I try a spoonful of fish ball curry sauce - it’s spicy and complex. I try another spoonful of the sauce that the catfish sits in. It’s less intense than the fish ball curry sauce, but it still has a kick. The waitress asks if there’s anything else I’d like to try. I decide I’ll just have the fish ball curry. I also order a potato bhorta and a pumpkin bhorta. I can’t settle on one. Bhorta are a lightly fried mixture of mashed vegetables and spices rolled into small balls. They sound like baby food, and almost have the consistency of it, except I’m not sure many babies would have palettes sophisticated enough to cope with the level of spice that those little balls hold. I am surprised that the bhorta are served room temperature. Still, they are delicious. The fish ball curry is superb. I eat it all on a mound of rice.
I want to go back. There are so many other things I will try. I must go with a group next time.
==
The next day we go to Rochelle Canteen for lunch with friends. This too is Shoreditch.
There are other places on my list of ‘must visits’ that we could go to - St John, Brutto, Brat, Noble Rot. But we want to go back to Rochelle Canteen.
Even in a city with so much choice, you return to places.
That strikes me as funny given, if I’m honest, the service at Rochelle Canteen annoys me. I tell myself, surely we could go somewhere where the food is just as good, but the service much better. But it’s the lure of the food. I like it. A lot. And so, we return.
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We choose entrees to share without much trouble: bread and butter, a plate of puntarelle dressed in an anchovy sauce, thin slices of ham off the bone with marmalade and cornichons and a piece of crusty toast.
I am racked with indecision when it comes to my main. I want the celeriac and Montgomery cheddar pie. I want the roast Sutton Hoo chicken with braised chicory and aioli. I want the mutton faggots with mash and mustard sauce. A faggot is a meatball made with minced up regular meat and minced up offal. An unfortunate name, really. The waitress tells us the faggots are very rich, which sways me in the direction of the chicken.
It’s easy to choose sides: a plate of potatoes and a bowl of dressed salad greens. We all speculate on whether the potatoes will even arrive. Here, they’re prone to coming out after you’ve finished your main and you’re turning your attention to pudding - another of the reasons why I tell myself I could just go some place else.
Pudding is a conundrum too - chocolate tart with creme fraiche or apple crumble with custard or a plate of cheese and chutney? All of the above? Chocolate tart it is.
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Having all of this choice is no hardship. It’s not deeply unsatisfying.
It’s confusing, and it creates the need for a certain kind of reasoning with oneself, a form of mental gymnastics if you will. And perhaps a certain amount of negotiation with your dining companions - “Please, Phil, can I try a mouthful of your faggots?” “Yes, only if I can have some of your chicken.”
But I don’t mind that. I like it. And anyway, you can’t have it all - we all know that. No point beating yourself - or a place - up over that.
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I am sitting on the tube in the only spare seat. Next to my feet is a discarded half eaten container of Tesco Southern fried chicken pasta. It looks insipid and yet it has an overly strong odour. It is obviously not mine.
Seriously? In a city of so much choice, why that?