Tinto's - Fulham, London

411 Fulham Palace Road
London, SW6 6SX
Website
How to Get There
Nearest Tube: Putney Bridge

So this is a sneaky entry before I leave for my holiday to Austria and South Africa...finally African entries inbound!

Fresh off the boat from South Africa, I landed in Fulham and found myself living there for 6 very happy years with my dear friend Tams. Tams and I have many things in common not least of which is a shared love of coffee and lazy Sunday's at home.

Almost on day one of moving in, I met one of my nicest neighbours...Tinto's.

Tinto's is a tiny, crazy little coffee place owned by a Colombian called Paul. Paul fills Tinto's with amazing Spanish and Colombian Staff who, if like me you are as much of a fixture as the papier mache deer head on the wall, will become firm friends within 3 visits.

Tinto's is to coffee what Cheers was to beer. Everyone in there knows your name and what you want without you even asking. Provided of course you've been there before...they aren't psychic (yet).

The coffee is amazing - let's face it who knows coffee better than Colombians? As by now you might have gathered I have a weird fixation with weak sweet coffee and so I always go for a single shot - two shots is guaranteed to put hair on your chest and quite possibly even your upper lip. They do all the usual great coffee options including iced ones for Summer and as Tinto's is located deep in Nappy Valley they also do BabyChino's to keep the Fulham Yummy Mummies happy.

Food wise, it's more sandwichy than hot plates but they do delicious bagels (my favourite is the egg mayo), toasties, quiche, muffins and bagettes. Iain swears but the Breakie Bagette. All guaranteed to fix hangovers.

So for 6 plus years I was in Tinto's a minimum of 5 times a week. Sometimes in my pajamas to pick up a desperate coffee fixer. Sometimes to meet friends for breakfast or coffee and cake. No matter what time of day It is always warm, friendly and full of happy people, dogs, laptops, kids and laughter.

Dropping in there today was like visiting and old dear friend that I miss loads. Do yourself a favour next time you are near the Thames in Fulham and pop in. Paul might even draw a heart on your cup for you.

...Oh and even after and 8 week absence they still remembered my order :0)

Ticking Tricking and Trucking in Shoreditch

Where we went...
Albion at Boundary
2-4 Boundary Road
Shoreditch
E2 7DD
Albion Website
Columbia Road Flower Market
Columbia Road Website
Sunday Shoots
Sunday Shoots Website
The Hoxton Hotel & Grill
The Hoxton Website
Nearest Tubes: Old Street, Liverpool


 Waking to another amazing London blue sky day, it was time to dig out the passport and head East.

Like the three Mustgetbeers, Melissa joined Barbara Squared in Shoreditch for a day of London Rambling. We kicked off our day at the Albion, one of the restuarants in the Boundary - a converted Victorian Warehouse. It's a really interesting development including several restaurants and bars plus a roof terrace which we will most definitely go back to in Summer.


Truth be told, the breakfast at the Albion was pretty average with a small selection of predictables, although the place itself is a trendy, pretty cozy deli style establishment.

Despite being accused of eating 'either Tick, Trick or Truck' (translation from Austrian - Huey, Lewey or Dewey to you or I) by a horrified Barbara P, I pressed on and tried the only vaguely adventurous thing on the menu - Duck Eggs on Toast. Tasted like plain old chickeny ones to me. But then I am a bit of a gourmet heathen. Melissa tried the breakfast sandwich and Barbara had the poached eggs and bacon. Both pretty standard stuff.

So in general, breakfast available to 12h30 - tick. BUT, No Eggs Benedict - Boo. No chefs specials or anything unusual double boo and a bit over priced to boot so sadly this is the first of my Room 101 flushes.

The rest of the day, however, was far more successful. From the Boundary, we wandered along to the Columbia Road Flower Market. Brilliant! We walked straight into an East End Christmas Tree Trader shitfight. I was offered so many deals I wondered if I had inadvertently stumbled into little Colombia by mistake. If you haven't been, I really recommend a trip on a Sunday. In addition to tons of flowers and plants, the local shops are fab - lots of quirky galleries, hole in the wall bacon butty stalls and fantabulous boutiques.

A word of caution though - at Christmas time it's not for the faint hearted. My quote of the day 'Watch your back love you might end up with a tree up your arse' yelled by a man narrowly missing me as he charged up Columbia Road with a Christmas Tree.

Retrospectively, we should have just had a bacon butty there or stopped at one of the little cafes lining the road or hidden inside the galleries. Ah well you live and learn.

We also discovered a brilliant playroom for the slightly narcissistic. It's the studio of Seamus Ryan, just off Columbia Road. Every Sunday, he invites members of the public to come in and take part in his 'Sunday Shoots' project. After having damn near broken his Slipstream Glamour Photo Booth, complete with wind machine and beauty lighting no less, we braved Seamus and his camera. The Jury's out till tomorrow but at least we didn't break his camera...

Once we'd worn out our welcome taking our own pictures, we headed back to Old Street and as clouds had come over and the temperature suddenly plummeted, we treated ourselves to an open fire, coffee and dessert at the Hoxton Hotel. I had a cheeky peek at the Hoxton Grill's breakfast menu and with things like bolied egg and soldiers, the ubiquitous Monsieur's Benedict, Florentine and Royale, quite honestly you could do worse than to stop off there on your way to Columbia Road...

A Spilloige Breakfast Special

Special Guest Author: Matthew Spiller (Spilloige, Signagezz, Maffew)

So how do I begin to describe Matt? I don't think my writing skills can do justice to one of the funniest, most talented, nicest, grubbiest, most genuine people I know.Oh and did I mention just a little bit mental? During my time on the road with the Red Bull Air Race, Matt was one of the founding fathers with me of the now infamous FOH team and on those ridiculous days when all else was failing, his sense of humour and ridiculous grin never did. He can also proudly claim evicting a chicken from site (amongst other stellar achievements).

Maffew's Top Tips

Ok Bazza, here goes....the magical morning grub up a la Spilloige would go a little something like this...

Home
On a warm weekend morning it would be two pieces of toasted sourdough, vegemite/marmite spread finly on the toast, half avocado mushed and spread, sliced cherry tomatoes, rock salt and a touch of lemon juice...yummo

Cooking for Friends
This was a favourite at the caff, named the Bristolian* it had a loyal following...

Toasted buttered bagel, two poached eggs, wilted spinach, roasted tomatoes and artichokes. Mushrooms baked with garlic and thyme. Home made hollandaise sauce tops it off, nice.

Out (Sydney and Wellington) 
Fundamental Fresh Food 266 Darling Street, Balmain NSW 2041, Australia

How To Get There
Cafe Berlin
249 Darling St, Balmain NSW 2041, Australia
How To Get There

The Little Marionette
1A Booth Street, Balmain NSW 2041, Australia
How To Get There
Fuel Espresso
Locations and Website

Living in Sydney you can get a little spoilt, so I will give you the regulars, Cafe Fundamental on Darling Street for the big brekkie, $16 include freshly squeezed juice and coffee, or Cafe Berlin for their Bacon and Egg baguette, classic, again on Darling Street in Balmain. Beverage

Coffee, coffee, coffee, recent favourite is Fuel in Wellington, tis a chain but they seem to have got it right with their little hole in the wall outlets, always good.

Sydney - The little marionette makes a nice strong brew,again in Balmain. Anywhere you see Campos coffee you should be ok. Little tip would be at the QVB where the buses leave from in the city you can pick up a pretty good flat white for $2.50 from one of the funny little kiosks.

Of course, the people, day, weather all contribute to the experience so a little advice to make it the chilled out start to the day that you want, would be to avoid American hotels with anyone from Austria in the morning when they ask for coffee

Order up!

Maffew

*Note from Beedub: Matt is too humble to admit the Bristolian was his Cafe. Wish it was still his so we could visit!

The Breakfast Club, Soho, London

33 D’Arblay Street
W1F 8EU
Website
How to Get There
Nearest Tube: Tottenham Court Road, Oxford Circus

Realising that ye old Blog was woefully neglected and having endured weeks on the recruitment merry go round (with the odd cheeky weekend in Austria thrown in), it was time to bust out and hit the breakfast circuit again.

Blue sky in London in Winter can only be a good omen and so with a pasty sun on our backs we set off for Soho. Seemed like a good direction based on a secondary requirement to good grub - interesting photographic subjects. Melissa, one of my co-pilots, is now the proud owner of a fandabulous camera and needed to test drive it.

So to Soho we went in search of the infamous Breakfast Club. Having been there previously for coffee, its been on my hit list for some time.

Now, any place called The Breakfast Club and which serves breakfast dishes all day, every day, can't really go far wrong in my book. We arrived to find a queue outside - clearly we weren't the only breakfast freaks. I am not sure who was more relieved when they let us inside - us or the poor people seated at the table next the window who had had to endure us pressing our noses against the glass oggling their food.

Inside, The Breakfast Club is kitsch and cozy and rammed. We were seated cheerfully on top of each other and beneath a gorgarse picture of The Hoff resplendent in Speedo and Santa Hat. We had already wrestled a menu off one of the other desperados camping in the queue outside and so we all knew exactly what we were having. The menu had me at Eggulars. But to be fair, I would happily cheat with the Mr Big Stuff section or one of the little beauties in the And Finally bit. 

Although I was really tempted by the Green Eggs and Ham (see the entry on Huckleberry's, LA for why), how could I resist a dish called Ham Very Eggstatic? Retrospectively, I should have waited for the monster of all hangovers to enjoy this beastie - a stack of pancakes laced with ham and cheese and topped with a fried egg. Oh and drowned in maple syrup to boot - apparently inspired by some bloke called Roger on Twitter. As (for once) I wasn't experiencing the stomach turning, grease craving clutches of a post mojitto overdose, it was actually too much for me and I would happy have swapped with Melissa who had the All American Breakfast (another but slightly less rich mix up of pancakes, bacon and eggs) or gone for one of the yummy French Toast  tasties.

Iain had the Full Monty. A most definitely man sized full English breakfast feast to be found in the Mr Big Stuff part of the menu. And Full Monty it was. He was still staggering around with a pot belly 4 hours of Soho rambling later.

I was gutted not to be able to have the Chocolate Orange Latte in the special Christmas drinkie section but they passed my stupid latte order test and made me a suitably milky vanillary concoction which passed the Beedub standard with flying colours. As did the fresh orange juice. So add to that the fact that you can eat Breakfast all the way until 5pm AND they have Eggs Benedict, Florentine and Royale, The Breakfast Club is most definitely a must.

There is no question that I will return soon, but I might wait until that special Sunday morning which dawns foggy with a hint of headache and a desperate craving for a gigantic eggy feast...

PS not to mislead those healthier than I, there are also loads of healthy choices and the smoothie menu looked lush