Rare is the day when both Marto and I both separately decide that we want to visit the same cafe on the same day. Independently we had both discovered Chriskitch last week and waited until the weekend so that we could go together. I was keen to try the coffee and cake and admire the vintage furniture; Marto told me that he came across the cafe on the wine forum he frequents and was excited that a chef who had worked with Gordon Ramsey and Alain Ducasse was serving food just down the road from us.
We were not disappointed. We started with cake. Lemon pound cake, to be exact. It was beautiful. I had a nice latte, Marto a mint tea. We were sat at a huge butchers block with vintage school chairs, in the enormous front window, full of light. Under foot, vintage floorboards from a factory in Islington. There were newspapers. (although we had the baby with us, so reading was impossible. but it would have been a lovely place to read, sans bebe). Sugar cubes in vintage tins.
The salads tempted us. A perfectly roasted chicken leg, drizzled with a teeny bit of oil and sprinkled with salt, to serve. A plate of a gorgeous selection of salads, as pretty on the plate as in the mouth. My favourite was leeks, peas, broccoli and samphire but they were all delicious. The chicken leg served with roasted vegetables. Mouthful after mouthful of sweet roasted garlic, pulled out of it's skin, crunchy slightly bitter almost charred lemon and chili falling apart and off the stalk. Roasted red onion. Better even than Marto cooks at home, and that is saying something. It has to be a good restaurant these days for the food to be better than we eat at home.
And then a pudding. How could you not when the owner comes over to discuss the food and recommends the treacle tart to finish. A macchiato and a little bit of chocolate torte with it for Marto (courtesy of Chris, the owner, because as he put it, "you've got to have a little bit chocolate with a macchiato").
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Chriskitch
7a Tetherdown, Muswell Hill
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