Hands down, the best place to get your lunch and your weekly veg in London is the maze-like farmers' market snaking around beneath London Bridge (literally) just off Borough High Street across the river in Southwark. Monday through Wednesday, it's strictly a wholesale produce market, but Thursday, Friday, and Saturday it goes retail. You can do your usual farmers' market vegetable shopping, and by July there's usually quite a selection of fresh vegetables on hand. Some of the stands are farmers' market standard:
And some a crazy high end, like this guy selling his Jersey-grown tomatoes for two-pounds-fifty for five, or about a dollar a tomato. (That's the original Jersey, by the way, which makes me wonder if there's something of a trans-geographical tomato obsession going on here -- ever talk to a New Jerseyian about New Jersey tomatoes and you'll know what I mean).
One thing I really love about Borough is that it is resolutely, unapologetically British. Which means -- more than anything -- meat, whether farm raised or shot on the hoof.
Neo-British cuisine has definitely come into its own and this is the place to come if you're going to try your hand at it yourself. Dorset wood pigeon, anyone? (Unfortunately the rifle-shot rabbit looks like it's sold out.)
Tradition dictates that the basic meal is meat-and-two-veg, so don't forget your neeps and tatties.
And let it not be forgotten that this fine game-ridden nation is also an island, where you can get scallops as big as your fist that were still in the water early that morning. These dudes even run a stand in the corner of their shop where they'll grill three of these babies up and serve them on a bacon beddy-by right in their shell for your lunch.
And that, really, is why you're here, especially when you're a poor schmuck graduate student trying to live in this town on a meager research stipend, and stewing your own game isn't really an option. You've been buying nearly-expired Tesco sandwiches for a week for a reason: so you could come to Borough for lunch. This market in particular is almost more about the food stands than about the produce, per se. Thanks in part to this European Union they have going on now, the stands tend to have something more of a continental flavor to them. One of the best is the dudes peddling raclette-and-potatoes over by the gate to the Southward Cathedral churchyard. Basically, they have these gigantic wheels of semi-funky cheese rigged up under propane broilers, like so:
Once it's good and bubbly, le dude will scrape the molten layer off onto some roasted baby potatoes, with a side of spicy gherkins on the side.
Sounds almost too simple to be all that impressive, but I wasn't exaggerating when I explained to le dude that, the research be damned, I'd really come all the way from America just for this. And don't be fooled: it's a lot of cheese. If you're flying solo, I recommend fasting all morning and part of the afternoon, at least, before digging in. Most people, though, bring a buddy.
If you are feeling the continental vibe, just be careful not to be fooled by the gigantic paella pan at the stand over by the steps leading down into the market.
You watch closely and you notice the bastards just come out every 10 minutes or so and refill it from these gigantic industrial cafeteria serving tray type things. Who knows, it could even be pretty good -- but I don't want to see that the wizard behind the curtain is just some pimply kid dumping safforn rice into what is really just a decorative gimmick. Of course with lunch, just like with the produce, you can't go wrong with the really local fare. There are nigh-on a dozen places, at least, selling some form of meat between bread; this is, after all, the birthplace of the sandwhich. Queue up and get in on the game.
If you're going to indulge in some British kitsch, this is definitely the place to do it; forget just blindly picking a pub for a Sunday roast -- you're likely to end up with something that tastes like rot. Far better to take up the Borough's offer of three posh bangers in a bap -- that's sausages on a roll, to those of us who actually speak English.
These are the little babies they were cooking up, and they were delicious. (See, if you don't eat all day, and then swing by the market in late afternoon, you can basically hit it up for that very special meal that falls somewhere between lunch and dinner.) I just hope for my own sake that this is the only time I ever have occasion to ask another man, "You mind if I take a photo of your bangers, mate? ... It's for my website."
And of course when closing time comes around, anything really perishable starts to go at cut rate prices. You might just get some portuguese custard tarts at two-for-one.
Once you've got your food, you can escape the crowds around the market and head over to the Southward Cathedral churchyard to eat. At this point, especially if you've had the best cup of coffee in London over at the Monmouth Coffee Shop, you're probably growing a bit concerned about the seeming absence of public bathrooms. But then you're not thinking like a Brit. There's pubs on every corner, mate, and they don't call it a public house for nothing. And after all that it's time, in the inimitable words of one of my old Boston roommates, to walk it off. The Thames Path runs right nearby, and you can walk as far along as you want to take in the sights.
Tate Modern is up the way a little bit, along with the National Theatre, the Saatchi Gallery, and the London Eye, if that's your thing. You could also cross the millenimum footbridge over to St. Paul's and the Strand, or Waterloo Bridge to get to Big Ben and Westmister Cathedral. Or better yet just stop at a pub along the way, grab a pint, and watch the river roll on by.
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