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Just when I was about to mourn the demise of Coma y Punto, my favourite Colombian joint in Brixton Market, in its ashes arose another one, El Rancho de Lalo.
They still serve the same good reliable Columbian fare. My all-time favourite bandeja paisa, a huge platter of meats and carbs is just as perfectly cooked and plentiful as at Coma y Punto and costs the same 9.50. The way they make the pig belly crunchy on the outside and juicy inside is inimitable.
They have spruced up the interior and exterior (it was rather shaby before). The maitre-d' swaggers around in the Colombian national costume. The lunch deal: one main + one drink for 6 quid fills up even a glutton like me. I had once their oxtail stew and another time their sancocho,which I succesfully tried to replicate later. Can find no fault with either.
Pro's: Super friendly service. Consistently good food. Great location for Brixton people-watching.
Con's: Slightly cramped seating.
In a nutshell: God bless South America for its food!
El Rancho de Lalo
94-95 Granville Arcade
Brixton Market
London SW9 8PS
ccording t
o my Chinese doctor, amino acids from meat are at their most digestible when in broth. This is why I cooked this Colombian sancocho soup for my sick landlord, who after 2 years of my relentless propaganda, had caved in and quit his 40-odd-year vegetarianism madness.
The original recipe calls for oxtail but since this time I had not stocked up on that, I made do with meat balls from the rundertartaar (pure minced steak with no fat or connecting tissue) I had brought from Amsterdam. I tried to imitate the wonderful sancocho I had indulged in a couple of weeks before that at the Colombian restaurant at Brixton market. It came out beautifully!
So here's the recipe:
- Peel and finely slice half a head and 3 onions. Reserve a few cloves of garlic unsliced.
- Sauté 2 onions and sliced garlic in a squiggle of olive oil until nice golden brown. Add some fish sauce or salt as well as very finely sliced Scotch bonnet pepper towards the end, if you like it spicy.
- In the meantime, put one sliced onion and a whole head garlic in a pot with water (about 2 litres). Add some whole crushed black pepper corns, 2 carrots peeled and cut into small blocks and a stalk of celery, sliced. Add meat at this stage if you are using bones or oxtail. Put on fire, allow to simmer until the meat start coming off the bone.
- Tip 2 into 3. Add the meatballs as well as diced cassava, sweet potato, green plantain, mandioquinha, chayote, garden eggs, or whatever other South American veg you get hold of.
- Simmer until the vegetables are soft enough to eat.
- Serve with chopped spring onions and coriander or parsley.
rixton market is full of surprises. Perhaps, about the only thing you won't find here is penguin meat. The rest is there. After my love at first bite with a Colombian chorizo, I discovered a Colombian restaurant there.Coma y Punto is a simple café right off Coldharbour Lane. A Colombian flag is hung right outside so that you wouldn't mistake it for an Egyptian or Vietnamese place. It is constantly swarmed with Colombians - a good sign, at least qua food authenticity.We started with drinks: Pony, a sweetish Colombian malt drink for Floyd, and sugarcane juice with a dash of lime for me. My drink was very different from the sweet and aromatic greenish liquid I was used to in Thailand. It looked and tasted more like Russian stewed fruit compote.
The bandeja paisa (£8.50) I ordered is a quintessential Colombian dish. It combines all cultural influences that are present in the country - indigenous, Spanish and African as well as, perhaps, at least half of Colombia's protein deposits. My platter consisted of:- ground grilled steak
- chicharrón (fried pork rind)
- fried beans
- a fried egg
- fried chorizo
- fried plantain
- boiled rice
- sliced avocado
- coleslaw
- an arepa (flat unleavened corn bread)
As you can see even if from just the description, it was a meal fit for a giant.Floyd's giant carne a la brasa, thin slices of grilled beef (£9.00), arrived with rice, fried plantains, coleslaw and two hash brownies.
As we tucked in in our food, a plasma screen on the wall kept displaying video after video of Colombian music. A lovely touch, adding to the ethnic experience. The simple and honest peasant food is perfect to provide you with nutrients for a day of hard work. Just as English breakfast, it is a bit of a guilty pleasure though.Pro's: Lots of protein and calories to get you going for the whole day.Con's: Cramped seating.In a nutshell: Authentic Colombian food at great prices.
on't let me anywhere close a food market! I just received a shipment of exotic foods from Amsterdam - 3 packs of REAL tempeh, dry gado-gado sauce and a bag of quinoa among oodles of other goodies, but I still went to Brixton market and committed a careless thing. On my way home I happened on something I could not resist. At 80 p a pop how could I? This time it was chorizo colombiano, home-made Colombian sausage.The people at the shop did not seem very willing to divulge the secrets of their trade, so the only thing I found out about chorizo colombiano that it is made of half pork, half beef with garlic and herbs.Some things need no additional touches. This sausage is one of them: it's chunky succulency only takes a quick fry and some garnish, arroz con coco (coconut rice) and ensalata mixta. This chorizo is hand-made at the butcher's, so unlike its cousins of factory provenance, meat in it occurs in discernible chunks. As you cut through the sausage, out bursts a heady aroma of garlic and fresh coriander followed by surprising quantities of rich juice.I first took out a bottle of red but then change my mind in favour of some gorgeous Chilean white. This Pedro Jimenez from Chile's Coquimbo Valley has a fresh vigorous taste with a final nose of passion fruit. It goes perfectly with the herby fragrance of chorizo colombiano.Carniceria Los Andes, 1st Avenue, Brixton Market, London.
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