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The Old Dairy at Vauxhall City Farm
We think we may have identified the most child-friendly corner of Greater Kennington, with the opening of the new extension to Vauxhall City Farm, and its star attraction, The Old Dairy Cafe.
A slick building with clean, minimal lines, it is at odds with the crafty, homespun aesthetic of the original farm buildings, which started life as a squat, and a neat visual metaphor for the area it sits in. It’s been busy on both occasions that we have visited, but there is plenty of seating both inside and out, with picnic tables around the duck pond for finer days.
They offer superior sandwiches and cakes – including gluten and dairy free options – and simple, homespun food, with a soup, salad, quiche, open sandwich and hot dish of the day in smaller and larger portion sizes, mostly vegetarian. We ordered the white bean “risotto” with asparagus, spinach and onion broth, and understood why quotation marks had been inserted once it arrived without a grain in sight. The leek and feta tart with olives and capers, and sun-dried tomato Spanish omelette were more satisfying and accurately described.
The cake stand:
For their core customer, they also provide a wide variety of Ella’s Kitchen products, a hot kids’ meal of the day (again in smaller and larger portion sizes), as well as a selection of mini sandwiches for smaller hands, and a pile of the iconic Ikea Antelop highchairs stacked in one corner, all in immaculate condition. There is a children’s play area in one corner of the cafe, and when we visited during their ‘Spring Spectacular’ there was a charming and well-attended story and rhyme time with an animal theme, complete with props. Watch out Tea House Theatre, pay attention NCT groups, there’s a new destination in Kennington’s own Nappy Valley.
Back to the revamped Oxymoron at the Royal Oak for food by Marcello
When we first wrote about The Royal Oak on Fitzalan Street, it was Kennington’s mystery pub. Now its mysteries have mostly been revealed, but it remains a magical place, with decor and atmosphere quite unlike any other pub we’ve been to.
Marcello is their new Italian chef and since his arrival the pub feels less like a squat and more like the finished article. It’s still highly eccentric, with resident pets and children, and the landlord William temporarily unable to serve because he’s fixing someone’s bike or showing off fossils he has found on the banks of the Thames, but you no longer feel like the flooboards are about to collapse beneath your feet.
There’s a lovely beer garden which catches the evening sun:
If these stacks of animals were at Newport Street Gallery they’d be selling for millions:
The Dundee Cake is not on the menu sadly, but the wildly diverse clientele did include a large contingent from Dundee, plus some twenty and thirty something hipsters, pillars of the community like the Earl of Bedlam and the queen of the Ragged Canteen, and a few stalwarts who’ve been drinking there for decades.
So what is on the menu? They serve food on Fridays, which is burger night with veggie and vegan options, Saturdays, which is fresh pasta night, and Sundays, when we went along. The food has a homemade vibe, with lots of flavour and lots of salt (like the pub and their fliers, come to think of it). They also serve sizeable, slow cooked meat and veggie brunches on weekends from 10am-3pm.
Starters cost £4. We went for some moist and salty fried courgettes with polenta chips:
Mains are £8.45. There were only two options so we had one of each. Chicken breast wrapped in parma ham served with taleggio fondue and braised fennel was creamy and indulgent. And this was a hearty risotto of radicchio & balsamic vinegar, with mature cheddar grated on top:
They have an uninspiring selection of beers on tap including Meantime Pale Ale, but we’ll forgive them as they make a point of serving our favourite Kernel by the bottle.
this is an old photo of the bar, which looks about 10% less chaotic now
There is so much going on in this pub we almost forgot there was a jazz/blues guitarist playing live. Before the guitarist came on, the music choices included Decades by Joy Division (one of the darkest pieces of music you’ll ever hear, requested by one of the Dundee contingent), and Topknot by Cornershop, which William informed us featured M.I.A. before she was famous, or as he called her in the manner of an old friend, Maya.
As you can probably tell by now Oxymoron is not your average pub, and it might just be our favourite.
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Address: 78 Fitzalan St, London SE11 6QU
Phone: 07515 878976
Jeff Koons Now at Newport Street Gallery
One of the writers of this blog is a philistine who can’t abide modern artists explaining their art but enjoys shiny, colourful, huge, spectacular objects with a novel and amusing concept behind them. Jeff Koons fan? Yep, absolutely, so we were thrilled to hear the second show at Damien Hirst’s Newport Street Gallery would be Jeff Koons Now.
The huge, light Newport Street Gallery space provides the perfect setting for Balloon Monkey (Blue):
Likewise this giant Play-Doh has Newport Street Gallery written all over it. This is made of aluminium, while Balloon Monkey (Blue) is made of stainless steel:
The only x-rated pieces are in the final room downstairs, but they’re so x-rated we believe they would be illegal if they were on a popular local blog rather than in an art gallery, so here’s a silver train instead:
Entry is free and the gallery was buzzing but not excessively full during our weekend visit.
Naturally the gallery shop stocks some Koons expensive tat art:
Welcome to Kennington Jeff – we haven’t been this excited since the two Kevins, Pietersen and Spacey, came to town.
Sidsel Meineche Hansen: SECOND SEX WAR at Gasworks
We rather like visiting Gasworks since their refurb. It’s a lovely building, open on the weekend which suits us, and we’re generally the only visitors.
The current exhibition won’t be to everyone’s taste, and is definitely not suitable for children. SECOND SEX WAR is a solo exhibition by London-based artist Sidsel Meineche Hansen, which “explores the commodity status of 3D bodies in X-rated digital image production, while also reflecting on the artist’s working conditions and relationships”.
The exhibition provides a chance to try an Occulus virtual reality headset, showing a CGI animation called DICKGIRL 3D, or you can watch it on a flat screen TV hung from a “DIY BDSM” structure:
There’s also a CGI animation called No Right Way 2 Cum, a feminist ‘cum shot’ video, which features EVA v3.0, a stock 3D model made for computer games and adult entertainment. This was made in response to the British Board of Film Classification’s recent ban on female ejaculation in UK-produced pornography. We don’t want an X certificate on this blog, so here’s a huge clay relief instead, called Cultural Capital Cooperative Object:
We think these laser cut drawing are called iSlave (non-dualistic) and Wannabe Dickgirl:
During our visit there was something going on in another room at Gasworks marked “participatory” or some such, but we were too scared to enter.
SECOND SEX WAR was commissioned by Gasworks in partnership with Trondheim’s kunstmuseum, which seems appropriate. It runs until May 29th at Gasworks, 155 Vauxhall Street, London SE11 5RH.
Opening times: Wed–Sun 12–6pm or by appointment.
Foam Talent – Shaping the Future of Contemporary Photography – exhibition at Beaconsfield
Foam Talent is the best exhibition we’ve seen at Beaconsfield and on our visit, it was also the busiest we’ve seen the gallery. It’s possible some of those in attendance came looking for Newport Street Gallery and found it closed (they’re currently ‘all mouths on nozzle’ to set up their Jeff Koons exhibition), but they seemed to be enjoying Beaconsfield all the same.
Detail from photo by Belgium’s Tom Callemin
Foam Fotografiemuseum is Amsterdam’s leading photography museum. Every year they do a talent call, receiving entries from all around the world, and this exhibition comprises over 100 photos from their 21 favourite entrants, all aged under 35.
detail of photo by Russia’s Danila Tkachenko
This is a photo of some bubblegum, believe it or not:
detail from photo by Hungary’s Marton Perlaki
The only Brit in the 21 is Dominic Hawgood, whose photos were inspired by healings and exorcisms in African churches in London (quite likely on or just off the Old Kent Road):
from Under The Influence by Dominic Hawgood
from Under The Influence by Dominic Hawgood
Foam Talent runs until May 22nd 2016, Wednesday–Sunday 11am–5pm, at Beaconsfield, 22 Newport Street, Vauxhall, London, SE11 6AY. Be sure to sample some delicious cake from Ragged Canteen while you’re there.
Apologies to any photographer who didn’t want an iPhone photo of their work online – get in touch if you’d like it taken down.
Burger Craft Diner at The Steam Engine
You could live in Kennington for many years and not know where The Steam Engine pub is (we know because one of us did) – Cosser Street, behind the Days Inn Hotel, is not the kind of location that gets much passing trade. It was only thanks to a tweet from @Faye_W that we discovered the pub had been refurbished and Burger Craft were now providing the food.
This is their Cheesy One burger for the reasonable price of £8, living up to its description, and to Burger Craft’s promise to serve the juiciest burgers around. For us, this was better than Dirty Burger and therefore the best burger in Kennington.
One quibble – the chips were too salty. Why do restaurants do that? If we wanted loads of salt on our chips we could add it ourselves.
We also tried to order the Pleasured by Veg burger but they were out of caramelised garden vegetable patties, so we had to settle for a very tasty portion of mac & cheese.
This is the kitchen:
The renovation is another one on the theme of “looking like someone’s living room”:
There was a good selection of real ales, both on tap and in bottles, a cheap wine list, and a warm cider option:
They also have a beer garden if that’s not stretching the meaning of “garden” too far:
Burger Craft is open every day from midday to 10pm, and the pub stays open till midnight every night, or 1am on Fridays and Saturdays. They also have a hostel on site.
Address: 41-42 Cosser St, London SE1 7BU
Sugar Pot – NEW CAFE ALERT!
Kennington Park Parade is taking over from the stuttering Windmill Row to become Kennington’s latest hot spot for shopping. First QueArts opened up there, and now, in the former premises of Peter’s Shoe Design Studio, there’s Sugar Pot, a brand new, rather lovely cafe that’s already doing great business, especially when the sun comes out:
Sugar Pot is run by a local family and many of the clientèle seem to be their friends – or perhaps they’re just good at befriending their customers. Either way, everyone is very friendly, staff and customers.
n.b. If you weren’t aware, San Pellegrino is very salty.
Their menu is getting steadily longer. So far it doesn’t include fresh juices or smoothies but watch this space. The bread is by… who else but the wonderful Kennington Baker.
We had the banana bread (they’re right, it is lovely warmed with butter), and a fresh mint tea served in vintage crockery. The daffodils came with the table:
So far they’re not open on Sundays but we hope that will change in the future – it’s the kind of place we’d like to visit on a Sunday.
Address: 248 Kennington Park Road, London SE11 4DA
If you’re thinking of opening a shop in Kennington, it’s not too late to jump on the Kennington Park Parade bandwagon – these premises are to let a few doors down from The Sugar Pot:
Walworth Garden Farm
You probably know about Vauxhall City Farm, on Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens. You may know about the newish Oasis Farm Waterloo, something of a work in progress on Carlisle Lane (Sadiq Khan visited there the other day). But did you know there’s rather a lovely Garden Farm just yards from Kennington tube?
Walworth Garden Farm is a charity and social enterprise which has been going for nearly 30 years (presumably they used to be based in Walworth).
They have very frequent events and courses, about gardening, beekeeping, herbal medicine and such like, or you can just pop in if the gate on Manor Place is open (that’s what we did).
It’s a real oasis, and very lush:
This bench is rather lovely:
They also have some sizeable greenhouses:
Address: 206 Braganza St, London SE17 3BN.
Pharmacy 2 with Ronnie O’Sullivan
We weren’t overly excited when we heard the restaurant at Newport Street Gallery was going to be Pharmacy 2. Damien Hirst is an artist whose reputation is built on great ideas, so why recycle one from the nineties? (The original Pharmacy opened in Notting Hill in 1998, closing in 2003.)
Then we heard the food would be by Mark Hix, longstanding friend of the (not young anymore) Young British Artists. We are fans of Mark’s cooking but it tends to be rather meaty, and the two times we went to Hixter Bankside it was almost as quiet as Gordon Ramsey’s place round the corner on Great Suffolk Street.
Also, our solicitation came to naught – we did not receive an invite to Pharmacy 2’s opening. But to make it up to us, they arranged for the most talented and compelling sportsman of his generation, Ronnie O’Sullivan, to be dining there with Damien Hirst during our first visit (Ronnie had the steak).
From the moment we entered and saw Ronnie, we had a great time. The decor may not be a new idea, but it’s fun to look at, and at least it’s not a Polpo rip-off. There are no other restaurants remotely like this in the area, and it seems to be doing well, being close to capacity for both our visits.
As for the food, most of it was great. Struggling to find a vegetarian main course, one of us had two starters instead, although we’ve since seen there is a vegetarian menu on their website (perhaps you have to ask for it). Anyway, these shaved winter squash with trevisano and Graceburn cheese cost £7.50 and went down very well:
As did these heritage beets with walnuts and chickweed, also £7.50:
Your other correspondent went for a flawless brunch option of smoked salmon and scrambled eggs for £9.95 (they serve brunch from 10am to 6pm every day except Monday when they’re closed):
On our second visit we had some tasty waffles with Yorkshire rhubarb for £7.95, but the brunch portion sizes are not large – more of a mid morning snack than a full meal.
The desserts are also small but cost just £4 so no complaints there. This pineapple upside-down cake was deliciously moist and nostalgic. So nostalgic that we went right back to the days when you just started eating instead of taking a photo first:
The only disappointment was a side of creamed spinach, which tasted like a pie filling without the pie, and was far too salty.
Nonetheless we can wholeheartedly recommend Pharmacy 2 for brunch, lunch, dinner or drinks. It’s great fun.
They’re open Tuesday–Saturday 10am–midnight, and Sundays 10am-6pm.
Address: Newport Street, London SE11 6AJ.
