relish

by whetham allpress

food ****
coffee **
vibe ****
value ****

The quietly booming cafe culture in east London is marred only by those new joints that beneath the surface are either just tarted-up sandwich shops or upmarket greasy spoons. Relish, however, is one of the proper ones, designed from scratch, sitting brand-spanking-new on the banks of Newington Green. It is firm evidence that Stoke Newington fine dining is drifting south.

It is designed as a cafe/deli with generous shelf and chiller space dedicated to finest european vittles. You’re probably not going to do your grocery shopping there but you might well collect a weekend treat or last minute dinner party opener after you’ve had your breakfast and read the free papers.

Coffee
We had two rounds of cappuccinos and lattes (they didn’t know what flat whites were so we defaulted) and unfortunately were a little disappointed. Like so many of London’s breakfast emporiums, the barista skills were sadly amiss. All four coffees were weak, too hot, and the milk was burnt. And the second cappuccino came out in a bloody great latte mug. Sighs of resignation and lament for London’s coffee shame.

Breakfast
After drowning our sorrows in free papers we consulted the hot breakfast menus. All the basics were covered from the full english through various poached egg and hollandaise combos to mushrooms and boiled duck eggs, and of course pancakes. A simple menu, and really when it comes down to it, all you want (as far as we were concerned quiche and salads and fish cakes come way later on a weekend, and are best kept out of a breakfast cafe menu, no?).
We ordered a round of pancakes, a full english and eggs royale (with salmon) and were handsomely rewarded. After the coffee fiasco, Relish lept back into favour with some very very nice food. The pancakes (bananas, berries and maple syrup) were not huge but lovely, fresh and just enough for two to get started with. If coffee is one litmus test for a breakfast joint, poached eggs are the other and the Relish chefs proved they knew what they were doing.
The full english was huge, well presented and sported crispy bacon and an organic sausage. The Royale was simple and perfect, the eggs beautifully tender, mantled in creamy hollandaise and mounted on finest flakey salmon.

So what the hell went wrong with the coffee? Relish should sit its front of house staff down and ask this question then go to all lengths to help its coffee makers to solve a problem that could keep it from being recognised beyond local borders as a place worth a trip to.

address: Relish, 44-45 Newington Green, London N16 9QH
telephone: 020 7354 4377