Life: Brick Lane Food Market

Martin and I went to Brick Lane yesterday. We'd seen London Coffee Festival being advertised and we were keen to go. Unfortunately everyone else in London seemed to have had the same idea, and being far more organised than the two of us, had already pre-bought their tickets. We decided that we didn't want to spend the whole of our Sunday queuing on the off chance that they might release some more tickets, so we went for a wander around Brick Lane instead.

Brick Lane is such an interesting and exciting place to visit. It's full of some of the best curry houses in London, and you can watch delcious bagels being made in front of your eyes. For once we bypassed the bagels in search of our lunch in the huge food market. There was so much on offer it was impossible to choose!

I started with a refreshing and creamy coconut Pina Colada.

How great do these carved pineapple look?

Because we're greedy and like trying as many different flavours as possible, we chose two main dishes and shared them. We began at this Ethiopian vegan and vegetarian food stall. 

When there's so much to choose from, I never have any idea what to pick. I usually end up panic picking and choosing completely the wrong thing! Instead, we let the lady working on the stall pick for us and this is what we ended up with:

This whole dish came to £5 which I thought was pretty good value considering the generous size! After our ultra healthy first lunch, we went on the hunt for something slightly different. There are so many places to choose from in Brick Lane: Chinese, cuban pork, Indian, Vietnamese, Italian, Thai, Caribbean, hog roast...

We decided on homemade pasta on a stall run by three very friendly Italians. They were hand making pasta infront of our eyes. After much debate we chose pumpkin and amaretti tortellini. You could also buy tagliatelle in some amazing flavours such as straw and hay and squid ink and lime. Next time we go back, we'll definitely have to try those too. The tortellini was al dente and served with parmesan and olive oil. It was so rustic and tasty.

It's not only food that can be found on Brick Lane. There are plenty of vintage clothes shops and record shops too. Rough trade record shop is a particular favourite. I also like looking at what the clothes stalls have on offer. These tops caught my eye immediately, and at £8 each, I thought they were quite a bargain. I snapped up one straightaway.

Here's a selection of some of the other photos I took.

Which food markets would you recommend to visit? What sorts of foods do you like the most?