The Company Shed and The Coast Inn, West Mersea

This blog has gone offshore, but only as far as Mersea Island, Essex, a paradise for watching birds, countryside strolling and eating seafood.

The Company Shed (Coast Rd) is a shed attached to the office of an oyster-catching company. Bring your own bread and water or wine and help yourself from the assortment of glasses on some shelves. The room is not opulent - just trestles and odd chairs and tables. There is no booking here: if it is full, you give your name and sun yourself outside on the patio chairs until a table comes free.

A seafood platter for two is around £17 and comes with various sizes of shelled and unshelled prawns, cockles, green-lipped mussels, a crab, smoked salmon and mackerel. I'm not a huge fan of seafood but this was very good, though could not bring myself to try the mussels. White meat in the crab claws was well worth the effort, being so sweet.

Later, supper at The Coast Inn (also Coast Rd). Homemade chicken Kiev with chips and salad and medallions of pork in a cream and mustard sauce and served with mash. Chicken so-so only, pork very good, mustard sauce really yum. Warmed brownie with toffee ice cream to follow. Around £28 with drinks, the latter being very cheap; had to ask the bar staff if they'd made a mistake when I was charged £3.50 for a pint of bitter and an orange juice and soda.

Cappuccino count: 7/10. Not super-dooper gastro but pretty good. Unsure about the mussels, but prices in The Company Shed are really rock-bottom. Mersea Island worth a visit anyhow and will certainly go back.

Maria's Market Cafe, Borough Market

How about this for fast food? A seasame bap, buttered and laid up with a slice of cheese, a slice of bacon, a splodge of potato bubble and a dollop of ketchup. Add a cup of tea, suspiciously brown in tone and with, by the taste of it, steri milk. Just delish. £4.30. Cappuccino count: Sling your 'ook, pal, we don't sell foreign muck. 7/10.

Simplicity, Tunnel Rd, Rotherhithe

A much-anticipated return visit and I'm going to keep belthering about this place in the hope that the people who read this site (yes, there are regulars, apparently) will go. Better yet, I'm actually going to put my money where my mouth is and try to go at least once a week for breakfast (most likely) or supper (less often).

The perfect refuge on a rain-soaked Monday evening and the chef-patron is chatty, knowledgeable - very - and devises the menus according to what he has bought and likes the look of. Cares about wine.

Starters: Cajun chicken with a mixed leaf and pepper salad; warmed goat cheese on mixed leaves with a pesto dressing. Wonderful charring and crusting on the chicken, which was firm and flavoursome. The salad was colourful and lemony, zesty but not in an overpowering way. The goat cheese and pesto were a revelation with tastes and textures coming in waves, unwrapping themselves. Excellent.

Mains: 80z Brazilian steak, rare, with sauteed potatoes, green beans, carrot batons and Bearnaise sauce; pesto-stuffed chicken breast roasted in ham and served with the beans and on a potato and carrot hash brown sort of thing. None of this could be faulted. The centre of the steak was melting, juicy, a good bite.

Dessert: lemon tart. Very short pastry and the filling was certainly lemony, though with more of a cheesecakey-type texture. A welcome departure from the lemon curd-like efforts which pass themselves off as lemon tart elsewhere. No hint of the dish being overloaded with sugar, the cause of that rush and burn in the back of the throat. My bet would be that this was made on the premises rather than being a "bought-in" pud. Berry coulis on the plate and a dusting of icing sugar were nice touches. Maybe a sprig of mint would help?

Wine: Malbec-Cabernet served in lovely big glasses - just a splash in the bottom so that it could start giving up its little treasures. Taste goes from sweet fruits to tartier berries and then a hint of pepper when the finish arrives.

£52 with coffees thrown in.

Cappuccino count: 9/10. Simple but importantly good food and Simplicity will succeed if enough people hear about it and go. They need bums on seats. There is branch in Manchester but I gather it is being sold on so that all effort can be put into this one.

Castello, Jamaica Rd, Bermondsey

Main-street Italian eaterie where booking is the thing to do since it is very popular. Uniformed waiters and a charming and energetic maitre - elderly, dapper - who works the floor really hard. Kitchen visible over a counter top.

The order: mozzarella salad and melanzane parmagiana plus bread to start; pizza with artichoke, ham, olive, linguine punte di manzo and lasagne with a shared side salad as mains; strawberry melba and vanilla ice cream with chocolate.

I suspect everything is assembled and cooked to order as there was a suitably long wait for the courses to arrive. This is not at all tiresome as there is plenty to look at and listen too...conversations and lively behaviour from the other diners that would make one's hair curl (if one had any). Lovely presentation, particularly of seafood dishes, such as the mussels in spaghetti which were conveyed to many other tables.

Linguine was fresh and strips of beef just flashed in a pan for a few seconds to ensure tenderness inside. This dish came with a cream and wine sauce with mushroom which gave way to pepper. Egg plants in the melanzane had been very thinly sliced and charred before assembly: nicely done and something I shall try the next time I make it at home.

The bill for three, including water, coffee and four spritzers, was £63, so this really is value eating on the doorstep. The floor is tiled and there are no soft surfaces to deaden sound, so when the place is packed - it always is - the noise might be annoying.

Cappuccino count: 8/10. Very good for geezers, south London dames and learning how to say "forty fousand fevvers on a frush's froat".

Other reviews here.

Red Chilli, Great Portland St, Manchester

Great expectations after reading in the Guardian a couple of weeks ago that this was worth a detour, if only to look at the names of the dishes. Would you eat something called Mrs Spotty's Bean Curd, a confection devised, apparently, by a leper? You ought to - it's lovely. I could not bring myself to order His 'n' Hers Sliced Lung, however. The predominant flavours on the menu are Sichuan, but there's other stuff for less robust appetites.

To start: prawn crackers and spring rolls - both quite okay; shredded mange tout in a sesame dressing and shredded chicken in a sauce. The mange tout was wonderfully refreshing and the perfect foil to the sauce on the chicken which, on a first tasting, seemed almost like a Thai peanut sauce but then, after a few seconds, shot flame from the bituminous regions of hell, detonating pepper corns in the back of the throat.

Mains were the aforementioned bean curd, served with a minced beef sauce and with a side order of Beijing dumplings, both pictured, filled with meat paste and veg, and, for the girls, shredded chicken with peanuts, peas, beans and pepper. A little too spicy for them, but the whole thing was so nicely done and with such nice staff that they want to go back to eat something like sweet and sour battered chicken. £48 for three including soft drinks.

Cappuccino count: 8/10. Some like it hot. Lots of favourable reviews on the web.

The Angel, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk

Eighteenth century grandeur in the town square and slap bang opposite the abbey ruins and the cathedral. Pictures show a building encrustulated with ivy, although most of it has been cut down. Still very grand.

A quick lunch: terrine of Suffolk ham with piccalilli served in a few leaves; rare tuna steak on green beans and skinned blanched peppers. My companion opted for mozzarella salad followed by beautiful little hand-wrought tortellini parcels with a cheesy filling. All delicious and beautifully presented, though this is another place where photographing the food would be to invite ejection.

£35 with a couple of drinks and a couple of double of espressos.

Cappuccino count: 7/10. A genteel experience. Food very good.

EV, Isabella St, Waterloo

Sorry there's no photo. I was so hungry, flustered and impatient that the plates were half empty before I realised. EV is in railway arches and includes a bar, deli and restaurant. Close by (20-minute walk in different directions) are branches of Tas, part of the same firm.

Started with a meze sampler with humus, kisir (crushed walnuts, oil, mint etc), dolma, tarama, kozda platlican (egg plant, tomato, garlic), felafal, some yogurty things, bit of bread. Followed with deep-fried squid in a sweet sauce and, slightly disappointing, koftie of lamb and pine nuts. But overall, very good and a lovely location. Just very relaxed.

Cappuccino count: 7/10. Staff really lovely but run off their feet on an unexpectedly busy Saturday afternoon. Will go again.

Patisserie Valerie, Old Compton St, Soho

I was asked recently to take a look at The French House in Dean St. It looks rather marvellous and I've made a mental note to sit in on a weekday afternoon, maybe in a month or two, with a bottle of something and to stare out of the window the while. But since I had one of my daughters with me, that particular avenue of pleasure was closed today. Instead, Patisserie Valerie, just around the corner in Old Compton St, provided the ideal alternative. The window showcases cakes decorated with swirls, curls and unimagined constructions of chocolate, lovely heaps of fruit and heart-stopping dollops of cream. All is yummy.

Once inside, it is best to go upstairs in the hope of getting a window seat. Failing that, anywhere will do. Smoking is allowed in half the room, though only until the general ban is introduced on July 1. Other than on public health grounds, this is regrettable: the place conjurs up smoky French provincialism of the 1950s and is the better for it.

The order was: citron presse for two, a pot of Colombian coffee, various sorts of club sandwiches, a little chocolate moussy thing and a raspberry tart with shortcrust pastry and filled with confectioners' custard. The sandwiches are prepared freshly on toasted granary bread and packed with meat, cheese, tomato, mayonnaise. Absolutely delicious. I can't say that the cakes are made on the premises but they were equally lovely. Lunch for two: £27.

Cappuccino count: 9/10. Very good.

Tapas Brindisa, 18-20 Southwark St, Southwark

And so from the ridiculous to the sublime. It is fatuous to claim to have a "favourite" place to eat in London, there being so much choice of both cuisine and venue, but if I had to name a current favourite, this would be it. Tapas Brindisa is found in a converted potato warehouse on the edge of Borough Market, across which there is a store selling most of the ingredients that feature on the menu. Getting a table is a matter of luck since bookings are not taken. One other point: there doesn't seem to be a high turnover a staff
- indicative, perhaps, that they enjoy the work and believe they are doing something worthwhile and doing it well. It is best to order a bit at a time rather than everything at once.

First order: two glasses of manzanillo fino - pale, cold, woody but not sour, very dry, lovely finish; a slice of potato torilla - tepid, sweet, soft to bite but firm and substantial on the plate, a light crust of egg and annoyingly impossible to reproduce at home; warm spinach salad with sultanas and pine nuts; five huge prawns served in hot oil that had been flavoured with sliced garlic and little red-hot chillis - a lovely bite sensation, fleshy, warm, white and firm. The tortilla and salad had a light dusting of rock salt which brought out all the other flavours.

Second order: bottle of rose rioja (garnacha and tempranillo blended with viura) - beautifully cold and pink with fruit flavours but not an overpowering smell, very good; charcuterie of Teruel Serrano ham, finely sliced pork loin, paper-thin chorizo and salchichon, also served with bread and a little bowl of peppery oil.

Third order: anchovy salad - a few fillets, not too salty, in fact not at all salty, with sliced sweet pepper, red onion, rocket, walnut fragments, garnish of mint and parsley; five slices of pork loin - browned on savoury on the outside, pink and melts-in-the-mouth soft in the centre and served with a large slice of Piquillo pepper, very sweet.

Still with me? I am getting rather ashamed now at the size of this meal.

Fourth order: chocolate mousse - beautifully piped out in a glass, chocolatey, not sugary; egg custard flavoured with cardamom and with a thin but crunchy brown sugar crust, almost like a sheet of glass (blowtorch?); two glasses of espresso with rum - a sudden and shocking boost of alcohol with caused instant flushing and beads of sweat on the forehead.

An hour or so at the table and the bill was £90, the most I have ever spent here. Never had a bad meal, only ever had good ones - breakfasts and lunches as well as afternoon snacks and quick coffees. Drop everything and go now.

Cappuccio count: 11/10. Transformed by gluttony into a barrel of sac and rolled home to bed.

Ikea Lakeside, Heron Way, West Thurrock

No visit to pine furniture Valhalla would be complete without a stop for meatballs, berry sauce, gravy, chips, a nice little franzipane cake with an iced top and a cup of coffee. I don't know what meat is in the balls or what berries are in the sauce but I do know that the gravy is similar in colour and texture to lathe coolant and, to continue the image, the chips are like swarf. You get 15 meatballs in a regular serving, 20 in les grande edition. Also on the menu is haddock in breadcrumbs, garden peas and chips with a slice of lemon and a sachet of Heinz tartar sauce. All the food is left on a hot counter, which is handy because the service is so desperately slow, as it is at the checkout. Coffee ok. £10.70 at the till.

Cappuccino count: 2/10. As with all junkfood, you are hungry 20 minutes later.

Little Chef, eastbound A14, Kettering

The inexorable slide towards awfulness continues, and there's not far to go now. Yet I remain fond of the brand and wish dearly that Little Chef was not in such straits. The order was a double Olympic burger - two 6oz patties of head, hoof and hide, bacon, cheese, onion rings, chips, lettuce, relish, tomato (£7.49) - and a mug of coffee (£1.69). Problems: the coffee was dreadful, either instant or too long in a jug. The burger came with ciabatta, which is simply not done - it has to be a soft, white bun. Decor shabby and staff trying their best but, I would guess, quite demotivated.

Cappuccino count: 1/10. Did not finish.

Piccolino, 33 Pepper Row, Chester

A Roman city - Deva - with chain-restaurant Italian food and the occasional re-enactment society centurion clanking by on the pavement across the road. One of them had forgotten to take off his wrist watch.

Anyway, Piccolino. I ate at a branch in Manchester a couple of months back and thought it quite good but a little expensive. The food is lovely, though, as ever, you're likely to eat better if you find an independent. The girls and I started with a thin pizza base doused in garlic butter and covered in passata, plus a basket of warmed focaccia served with bottles of extra virgin and balsamic vinegar to drizzle. Delicious.

Mains were: penne with meatballs for Lucifer; troffiette with torn chicken and asparagus for The Blonde; pollo valdostana (pictured) for me. This was chicken breast coated in very fine breadcrumbs, topped with mozzarella and stuffed with Parma ham. Good taste and texture to everything, chicken especially good. It came with a few slices of roasted pepper and a very light tomato sauce. Steamed spring veg with basil butter was a side order.

Unusually, the girls decline desserts, opting to share a plate of pralines. I had affogatto - a vanilla scoop in a shot of amaretto and with cold espresso poured over: easily one of the best puddings I've ever eaten, a brilliant taste combination with warmth and a good finish from the amaretto and amazing bitterness from the coffee.

£60 when a further double espresso and soft drinks were added, so not a cheap feed.

Cappuccino count: 7/10. No complaints about the food, except that there isn't quite enough of it for the price. Staff very polite and obliging.

The Red Lion, The Square, Bakewell

Chicken curry with rice and a poppadom, the poppadom resembling in texture a bit of badly flaky whitewash or bubbling paintwork. Maybe in taste too. Chicken ok but I am under no illusion that the sauce was carefully handcrafted in the kitchen using a mix of spices. Also, at nearly eight quid, it was a bit pricey.

Cappuccino count: 2/10. Appalling farts.

Le Flore de l'Ile, 42 Quai d'Orleans, Ile Saint Louis

A salon de the rather than anything more elaborate, but with Notre Dame over your left shoulder, the river a couple of yards away, and the Latin Quarter across it, who needs elaborate? In short, Paris all rolled up into a little ball of deliciousness, though, happily, without too many braying imbecile tourists, it being a mid week afternoon. Now, I am no stranger to hyperbole, but I ordered a ham omelette expecting something nice but ordinary. What came was possibly the best omelette I have ever eaten, solid and weighty on the plate yet as light as a mayfly's wing in the mouth, the egg like a pancake on the outside and still just about runny in the centre. Gorgeous ham and just a touch of salt for seasoning. A white plate dressed with a sprig or parsley and some tiny slivers of tomato. It really doesn't get any better than that.

Extras: Pastis, fine; nibbles, fine; bread and butter, fine; a club sandwich with deliciously sweet chips, like Spanish ones, fine; two grand double espressos, wow; a plate of nice little choccies, yum. 41 euros and I would have paid half as much again it was so good.

Cappucino count: 9/10. Don't tell the rosbifs.

The Dog and Bell, Prince St, Deptford

Take a stroll down Watergate St, SE8, turning left into Prince St, part of the route of the Thames Path. The Dog and Bell is on the left. In the bar a few locals are perched on stolls drinking and yacking. Today's papers are piled up on a table near the door, wood pannelling above the bar displays a handsome collection of beermats. A nice little backstreet pub. The usual sort of pub food is available but all I fancied was a bowl of chips with some mayo. Perfectly good. The chips were hot and fluffy inside and not at all greasy. I shall certainly go back and try other things. A couple of pints of London Pride washed it down. Two bowls of chips, around £4, two rounds of drinks, around £7.

Cappaccino count: 8/10. Worth a detour. Here's the website.

La Tasca, Queen's Square, Liverpool

One of a chain of friendly tapas bars with branches nationwide. Food totally yummy, good service and plenty of seating inside and out. Gets busy at weekends. My daughters can be finicky but swarmed over the seven plates we ordered - potatoes in a spicy sauce; slice of tortilla; a skewer of char-grilled chicken; seafood paella; lovely big prawns done with garlic; meatballs in a tomato and bean stew; salad with tuna and boiled egg. They additionally devoured a slice each of the most beautiful cheesecake I've tried - the top tangy and with lumps of dark chocolate and a marvellous flavour of oranges. No trace whatsoever of the sugary afterburn you get with so many chain-restaurant desserts.

With soft drinks and a highly acceptable double espresso, the bill was £46, and there was no rush or fuss. I really like it when I can get the girls to try something new - in this instance the langustinos and squid.

Cappuccino count: 8/10. Fun food, fun place. You can get better tapas but you have to look for them in independent places.

Poplar 2000 services, Junction 20, M6

... or, Lymm truck stop, of blessed memory, a place where mere motorists were formerly seldom seen. It was redeveloped a good few years ago and has a McDonald's and a Travelodge though we shall confine ourselves to the homely cafe where a full English breakfast - two bacon, two sausage, one fried egg on a slice of buttered toast, beans or tomatoes (sometimes both, depending on who is serving) is on sale for £4.20. Very appealing to my inborn Lancashire meanness.

I had hoped to publish a photograph of the fare but lost my nerve at the table. The place is full of dolts who would wail at anyone doing such a thing, accuse them of trying to steal their souls and send for the manager, leading to a nightmarish conversation along the lines of: "I'm afraid we don't allow customers to four-tow-graph the food, sir, I shall have to ask you to put down your knife and fork immediately and leave, or turn over your mobile telephone to me." "It's for my blog." "Be that as it may, sir, rules is rules - and you're frightening our other guests. Now, if you don't hand it over, I shall have to get our Eugene to come up from the boiler room with his coal shovel"...

Apart from the breakfast plate, I had a mug of something purporting to be coffee and an Eccles cake, the latter having been manufactured in Coventry. Total: £5.35.

Cappuccino count: 4/10. The food is crap, unless you like greasy breakfasts, in which case it is excellent. Transport canteen decor; good for watching people and being sneakily pass-remarkable about them. Don't forget to keep your till receipt, which entitles you to free parking at the local angioplasty clinic.

Carluccio's, Reuters Plaza, Canary Wharf

These places have been around for a while and are spreading out of London at quite a pace, but I've never been less than perfectly satisfied with the food and service. This particular branch suffers, maybe, because of the braying City types and power moms who feature prominently among its customers. However, to business: bicerin to drink, a first, and scrambled egg on ciabatta with sauteed mushroom. The bicerin was an interesting one-off. It consisted of an empty coffee cup and three jugs, one of espresso, one of melted chocolate and one of single cream. You mix them up in the cup and savour, though I found all the flavours and textures worked against each other. Maybe for the real experience, the thing to do would be to take yourself off to some dive backstreet cafe in Turin. The coffee, however, is really top-drawer and soon kicked in. For comparison, I ordered a double espresso to follow. It was very hot, dark, thick, bitter and with a trace of light-brown froth on top, the essence. I am still slightly intoxicated by these shots. On a previous visit I had the ristretto, which pops your brain straight away.

The main dish came with a sprig of parsley on the egg, which was itself parsley-flecked. I think I prefer egg done this way, folded rather than stirred. The delicacy and meltiness is so much better than I can manage at home where it is bashed around in a pan. Mushrooms had a touch of caramel about them and had been done in butter and kept drained nicely. Very good. Breakfast for two eating the same dish and with three double espressos and one bicerin, £17.55.

Cappuccino count: 9/10. These places are tightly managed to maintain the standard set by Antonio Carluccio's Neal St restaurant. There is a little shop out front where it would be very easy to run up a big bill. Coffee out of this world, food and service excellent. Pick your moment to avoid sharks in suits and hooraying media types.

Intro Juice and Cafe Paradiso, Shad Thames

Not long opened in premises that were formerly an old-style cafe with a gentlemanly though very elderly Cypriot owner, this is an eponymous juice bar whose owners plainly have a love of wordplay. Such gimmickry won't save them since it is hopeless, hopeless, hopeless and awful, awful awful.

The staff of enthusiastic baseball-capped teens all scuttle around behind the counter bumping in to each other. There is one juicer and two of those things that swill the ingredients into smoothies. So, however long the queue, only two orders can be zizzed up at a time.

Asked for two orange jucies and two pan au chocolat and waited 10 minutes at least. So much for fast food. The juice came with crushed ice - not asked for - and the pastries in separate paper bags. The pastries were OK but the juice had a trace of unpeeled carrot about it, some sort of taste contamination problem in the zizzers, I suppose. £6.50.

Across the courtyard from Intro Juice is Cafe Paradiso where, a week or two ago, I asked for two black Americanos and was given scaldingly hot brown water in paper cups. Had to tip it away. £2.50.

Cappuccino count: 2/10 and half an hour with a time and motion man for the junior juicers; 0/10 and a visit from the trading standards people for the others. These places exist to scalp tourists and office workers. Don't go.

Simplicity, Tunnel Rd, Rotherhithe

Good for breakfast and, earlier this week, supper, the subject of this post. They are getting there and should be okay if they a) reglaze the front window, which still has a hairline crack in it, and b) advertise a bit more.

Started with olives and peppers in a light though sweet oil dressing with thinly sliced ciabatta that had been lightly toasted. Moved on to herrings, three of them and with their heads and tails on, seared on the grill and served over par-boiled and then roasted potatoes, steamed French beans and carrots and some spring salad leaves with an unctuous balsamic dressing. The kitchen can be seen across the counter where the food is plated up. Quite theatrical but fun to watch, and the chef, who comes out to chat from time to time, takes great care over it. My companion went for chicken breast stuffed with cottage cheese, apricot and spinach and heaped up on mash. Plate decorated with carrots, beans and other greens. We skipped pud, though a neighbour was at a nearby table and seemed to be thoroughly enjoying some chocolate torte.

Simplicity is a cafe by day and a bistro by night offering a limited range of very well prepared and assembled dishes. Starters are £4, mains £10. Our bill, with coffees (getting better) beer and water, was £28.

Cappuccino count 7/10. Quite a little asset to have on the doorstep. Fingers crossed that they can make a go of it.

Blue Mountain Cafe, North Cross Rd, East Dulwich

Organic ingredients and some Jamaican items on the menu, such as jerk chicken and fried plantain.

Opted for The Full Monty - two bacon, scrambled egg, two sausage, tomato, mushroom, slice of brown toast with butter. The sausages were packed with meat and not much else and the bacon had a good colour and was, I suspect, air cured, there being no salty afterburn. Could have been eating gammon. Eggs beautifully done. Rather than stirring the mixture in a saucepan so that it came out lumpy, a flat pan of some sort was used, producing something more in the line of an omelette, velvety and delicate. Tomatoes softened on a griddle and served with a twist of black pepper. Mushrooms sauteed - nothing special. The meal comes with a coffee of your choosing, in my case a black Americano. This was on the high side of average, perfectly acceptable.

It is a very informal place where you can sit around all day jawing and where no one will bother you. Good street scene with much mooching to do and terribly fashionable Lordship Lane is at the other end of the road. Cafe gets busy at the weekends but there is an upstairs. Boho decoration with lots of leaflets for art classes and pilates. A cheering cliche but enjoyable over all. Maybe they should warm the plates. Two Full Montys with coffee and one glass of orange juice, the sort with bits in, £16.

Cappuccino count: 8/10