Japanese Fusion: Zaibatsu

The waitress was from Thailand, the chef was a Malaysian who has worked in top Japanese restaurants, many of the guests looked Japanese.  Pan Asian indeed.

Zaibatsu is an unprepossessing cafe on the highly polluted Trafalgar Road in Greenwich.  Steps away from the lovely Greenwich Park, I must have walked past this establishment many times without having given it a second glance.

So it was like unexpectedly coming across an oasis to open the door and find a full buzzing atmosphere with Chinese lanterns fro the ceiling, a largely Asian clientele and the bright colours of tables, chairs and platters of food.

We had gone to this Japanese fusion restaurant on the basis of several recommendations from friends, after mentioning this new blog.  Despite having been slightly more organised than for our firstr two visits and having booked a whole 24 hours in advance, we had failed to get a table for 5 people before 2.30pm so just 3 gannets went at 1pm whilst the Mr Gannets ate at a local pub.   Many have raved about Zaibatsu so we had to see for ourselves.

The menu had several pages ranging from starters, to noodle soups, to sushi to sushimi.  You can browse it here.   We ogled some passing sushi:

but decided that was for another day.  About £8 for 8 pieces in case you were interested - sliced from a single long roll.

We asked our Thai waitress for advice and she recommended sharing 3 starters and then ordering some mains.    We played that classic trick of looking to see what the guests at the next table were eating.  Tempura and noodle soup, it seemed.  Both looked delicious but soup is not suitable for sharing.

The tempura looked unmissable so we ordered that and added in an aubergine dish with sesame paste, a seaweed salad and a mixed tempura as starters:

We sat at a small yellow melamine table that looked like it had stepped out of a 1950's kitchen.  This place is not grand.

The food,  O Fellow Gourmand, was delicious.  Not haute cuisine (there was shell in the tempura prawn, the cutlery was 1970's school style stainless steel) but it was flavoursome and beautifully presented:  There were fanned out noodles that had been tempura battered to look like shells, and the aubergine came on a leaf platter.

We wimped out and ordered only 2 main courses between the 3 of us as this was a Saturday lunchtime and we needed to leave room for dinner later.  Even so we didn't manage to have much impact on our Dynamite Noodles (very hot, we were warned) and the Malaysian chicken curry.  "Who took all the chicken?" cried Gannet 1 as she ate yet another chunk of potato from the curry.  Gannets 2 and 3 both found plenty!

Again the food was delicious.

Admittedly we were not their best paying customers of the day - 2 glasses of tap water and 2 of diet coke - but we were staggered when the bill came to a tiny  £10.50 each for this feast we couldn't finish.

The waitress told us that all items on the menu are available for take-away and that we could phone ahead   020-8858- 9317,  or just drop in (90 Trafalgar Road - almost next door to the old Arches).  There were quite a few visitors during our meal who came in for the takeaway.  All 3 gannets are sure they will be making use of this facility in future.  Surely it has to beat Domino's hands down.

Value:  10/10
Ambience: unpretentious - simple and not the place you would go for a romantic date but perfectly serviceable and in a great location (for us!)
Authenticity:  10/10 definitely Pan Asian.  Not so sure if particularly Japanese but it's hard to do Japanese for a tenner.
Taste:  10/10  Delicious

It is advisable to book ahead.

Okay, now we turn to how to make lunch at Zaibatsu into a lovely (cheap) day out.

If you can get to London Bridge station or Cannon Street station, then trains are every 10 minutes to Greenwich and Maze Hill.  Maze Hill station is a hop and a skip from Zaibatsu (? 2 mins walk), but I would recommend alighting at Greenwich.  Then walk across the World Heritage Site Greenwich Park to get to Zaibatsu - leave at the gate by the children's playground.  If you have longer to play with then go round the National Maritime Museum completely free on your way.  On your way home, head straight down for the river from Zaibatsu and follow that West to the Cutty Sark then cut up through Greenwich town centre (and market) back to the station.

If Waterloo or Charing Cross stations are easier for you, then get the train to Blackheath and walk across the heath and park, passing the Deer Gardens and the Royal Observatory on your way.  To get home, walk back along the river to Cutty Sark dlr where you hop on a dlr to Lewisham to change for a train back to your starting point.  The Cutty Sark is expensive but worth a look from the outside.  You pass the Old Naval College and, time permitting, stop in and look.

If you simply insist on driving then park at the top of Crooms Hill or Maze Hill (free after 10am) to walk diagonally across Greenwich Park to the restaurant, or, for the very very lazy, park on Westcombe Park Road for free for 2 hours whilst you nip down the hill and into Zaibatsu for your meal.

Please do leave comments telling us what you thought of this restaurant and/or steering the gannets to fly to somewhere else in South London that you feel deserves a review.  It wold be nice for us to think that someone is reading this...

An Expedition to the Blue Nile-Eritrean Café in Woolwich 

“Tis the privilege of friendship to talk nonsense, and to have her nonsense respected”. – Charles Lamb

And what a lot of nonsense we talked. Thus we were a larger group that ventured into Woolwich on Saturday night.  The Gannets had brought their spouses; we even had a fledgling, but strangely she had become a swan, not having bred true to form. And we invited the Puffins from down the road.   7  in all. Best to be a in a group in Woolwich…….

Above:  Mrs Gannet 2, the lovely cafe owner and Mr Gannet 1.

Overall, much better organised than last week (although Gannet 2 - the Lesser Gannet - got lost again!)  

Gannet 2 (the Lesser Gannet) suggested to Gannet 1 (the Greater Gannet) that Woolwich was a “bit edgy”;  the Greater Gannet pretended that she was perfectly at ease, after all it had only been a 50 metre walk from the car park but those 50 metres would feel a lot longer when it was time to go home; cold AND edgy then.

The Greater Gannet had changed her place of work in September; “We are all going to the Woolwich centre; much better for integration of services”. As the Greater Gannet mentioned this to friends and acquaintances, she would see the shadows pass over their faces, but so many said, “But you can have lunch at the Blue Nile!”. “The Blue Nile is just round the corner”. “ Let’s meet at the Blue Nile”. “ Fab Ethiopian Restaurant in Woolwich, I hear”.

The Lesser Gannet had also heard of the Blue Nile, famous throughout London, and reportedly No 1 on Tripadvisor for a while. A whole article written in the Guardian to dissect what it means; and therefore an easy choice for our second outing.

The Blue Nile is an unprepossessing small restaurant, maybe even a café, set just opposite the new central development in Woolwich. (Greater Gannet’s spouse was very pleased to have such a clear view of the Carbuncle Cup winner from 2014).The food is not Ethiopian, but Eritrean. Very different countries, as various wars have determined. We cannot comment on whether the cuisine is different; maybe time will tell. However, Eritrean cuisine has been heavily influenced by Italian food, following on from involvement in Italian possession from 1889 to 1941.

The restaurant was a butcher’s shop in the past; white tiles, racks on the ceilings. However, the welcome was warm, and it was busy on Saturday evening; the tables were full, and there was a general buzz. The menu is not extensive, and the charming woman  “front of house” suggested we shared platters of vegetarian and meat “injerers”. A good suggestion, it turned out.  An “injerer” is a flatbread or pancake, which serves as an edible plate, and curries are piled upon it, and eaten with portions of the injerer; economical with the washing up, and tasty to boot. (We knew that there would not be cutlery, and had come appropriately dressed).

So, we enjoyed: beef and lamb curries; chick pea and lentil curries; spinach and kale curries. Condiments of salad and yoghurt.  An edible injerer. Washed down with lashings of Eritrean beer. We all finished up with pastries, a definite Italian influence noticed there, accompanied by lightly perfumed coffee, or Kemen tea; the latter being absolutely delicious and a resounding success.  It might look like normal tea but it has all the spices of mulled wine and Christmas.

And what value for money! Just on £20 per head.

So:

Value:           10/10   Don’t see how it could be beaten on price
Ambience:    8/10 Great for what it was; buzzy, lively and welcoming   

 Taste:            8/10     maybe a bit variable, but the beef curry was reportedly fantastic ( Gannet 2 vegetarian for January, and desperate  for a piece of steak)
Authenticity:  10/10     Absolutely.

 Should it be No 1 on Tripadvsor? Read the Guardian article, or visit and make up your own mind. However, we don’t think that you would be disappointed, and definitely a new experience and thoroughly enjoyable. 

And the conversation? Eclectic to say the least; one minute it was Graham Norton and what Miriam Margolyes had said the previous night (everyone was slightly shocked); the next it was ethical relativism . We also had a small lecture on how to tidy your drawers, thanks to the swan.

And then, home to bed, and an episode of the last series of Madmen; oh joy!

HOW TO TURN IT INTO A CHEAP YET CULTURAL TRIP

In the opinion of Gannet 2, any visit to Woolwich town centre in the evening is a cultural trip.  Not high culture, mind, but certainly different.  If you go during the day then you could always go first to the Waterfront centre for some wet'n'wild fun on water slides.  Or walk along the river to look at the Thames Barrier and try to guess whether or not it will survive the built in 5m sea level rise from past global warming gas emissions.

The first foray-A taste of Mexican Street Food in SE1

There was no possibility of taking a walk that day, so we drove.*

We set out as we mean to continue: organised and efficient in our quest to taste 52 different ethnic foods in 52 weeks in South London.  This translated to having 15 minutes in the rain to find and eat some Mexican street food at the Southbank Centre.  Our late running was partly because it turned out that Jane Eyre, as played at the National Theatre, was 3 and a half --years-- hours long and so started much earlier than one might reasonably expect.  It was honestly nothing to do with not having checked beforehand.

Given the limited time available, and the urgency of our mission - we were both hungry -  the choice  was limited to restaurants actually in the Southbank Centre:  Giraffe (perhaps African, suggested Greenwich Gannet One optimistically), 

Ping pong (Chinese), House (modern european) and Wahaca Experimental (Mexican).  No contest.  Especially as Wahaca had a street vending van right by the entrance to the theatre.  We knew it was Mexican as the van said "Mexican Street Food".   No fools, we.

So just past the concrete skatepark at Soutbank, having parked in the National Theatre carpark (£8 all evening after 5pm thus trumping 2 x return train tickets from Greenwich even presuming there hadn't been engineering works), we queued with the young and the fashionable at the street stall. 

 Point of order:  yes, we did trail the wrong way up Belvedere Street first in the rain, but we MEANT TO as we were casing the joint.   

This blog may also contain economic analysis of the top order:  by the time we had reached the front of the queue,  we had invested 5 minutes of our 15 and it was too late to duck out, so we were unperturbed when the charming young men serving (no sarcasm, they were  lovely) told us that they had nearly run out of vegetarian option and we decided to share just one tacos.

Running out was actually impressive as there was very little choice.  It was a tacos or burritos - basically soft or crispy pancake, all with identical fillings:  black beans, lettuce, salsa, sour cream, guacomole (50p extra) and an extra of chicken, pulled pork or tomato/onion mix.  So to run out of an option must have taken some doing.  More would arrive in 5-10 minutes but we didn't have the time.  The lovely serving man (see above) kindly gave us two boxes but was unable to cut the tacos in half.  Wooden cutlery and paper napkins were provided.  As it was £5.50 for one, the price came to £2.75 each.

We grabbed our warm silver foiled packet and ran into the national Theatre.

In any event, we would always rather be happy than dignified so did not shun the small standing table under the toilet signs and grabbed free cooled water from the tap at the bar. 

Reader, we ate it.  Oh no, perhaps that was Emma. Or Jane Austen. Is one of those an author and one a book????

The tacos was delicious.  Not hot, just tepid, yet tasty and filling.  We thought perhaps we should have gone for the "hot"salsa rather than the english option of "medium" but otherwise had no complaints.  Yum.  I doubt you could eat better for under £3 and in under 15 minutes including queuing. 

We had thought we would research each country before we tasted its food but the 15 minutes allowed this first week made that impossible so instead we both dredged our minds to see what we already knew.  Which was not much although Greenwich Guzzler 1 thought that Mexico City was the capital and that they deal a lot of drugs there.  I ventured that perhaps they spoke Spanish or Portuguese.  We are better at science than Geography.

The parts of the play for which we were individually or even collectively awake were rather brilliant.  The main point of discussion was whether or not the actor playing Jane was in fact Kirstie from the Archers.  And, if so, how she found time.  I went to the cast list on your behalves, lovely Readers, and they (un)helpfully had a list of the cast with photographs but don;t say who played whom.  That is as good as a chocolate teapot to one who is faceblind so I can't tell you which was Jane and then google to find out if she is Kirstie.  Obviously I could google them all but there is after all a limit to the lengths of research I am prepared to do on your behalf.


Value:           10/10   Best food for under £3 in London
Ambience:    7/10     We stood in the rain but it was by the Thames and very trendy
Taste:            8/10     Could have been 9/10 with the hotter salsa
Authenticity:  ?/10    Who knows?  We have neither of us been to Mexico.  No detectable drugs.                                              Italians serving.

Would we go back?  YES!  maybe next time we would splash out and go for the Wahaca cafe just above where you can actually sit down out of the rain.

* the literary amongst you may recognise the famous first line

HOW TO TURN IT INTO A (CHEAP YET CULTURAL)  DAY OUT
The Southbank centre is right by Waterloo Station for those from South London.  If you come from NE of London, then get Thameslink to Blackfriars and stroll along the south bank for 10 minutes to get there.  If arriving by some North of the river tube then alight at Embankment and walk back across the pedestrian bridge to South Bank.

So what else can you do having eaten at Wahaca?  D'oh, go to the National Theatre.  Friday Rush tickets go on sale every Friday at 1pm.  Tickets are a flat £20 each for performances the following week - this is the best way for the disorganised to get to see sold out productions.

Alternatively, stroll across the pedestrian bridge from the Southbank Centre north to Trafalgar Square.  You can nip into the National Gallery or the National Portrait Gallery for free if it's raining, or stroll around the sites and St James Park if it's a lovely day.