Borough Market, Southwark
Unlike Paris (Rungis) or Barcelona (La Boqueria), London doesn't have a market that exists as a living celebration of this country's indigenous foods. Instead, it has Borough, a self-conscious, some might say sanitised, by-product of Britain's recent rediscovery of good food – as a minority hobby, at least. Drawing together some of the country's best artisan producers and fine food retailers, the market is at its liveliest from Thursday to Saturday, when all its stalls are open and eagerly press free samples on the passing public. After a couple of circuits, a budget traveller could stave off their hunger without spending a thing. However, the market is also home to a number of permanent businesses which - particularly if you want to escape the tourist hell of nearby London Bridge - are a boon for the food-conscious but financially cautious traveller.
First, head to the grill outside Spanish importer Brindisa's store (Floral Hall, Stoney Street (+44 (0)20-7407 1036, brindisa.com). Its chorizo sandwich: smoky, hot paprika-packed sausage topped with fresh rocket and juicy piquillo pepper, on a chargrilled olive oil-dressed bun, is a five-star snack (£3.95/£4.95).
And outside Lawrence Keogh's Roast restaurant (Floral Hall, Stoney Street (+44 (0)845 034 7300, roast-restaurant.com), you will find Roast-To-Go (7am-3pm, 6pm weekends), a takeaway kiosk with scotch eggs, bacon butties and roast beef sandwiches (£1.80-£6) among other treats. An sample half-baguette comes filled with fried egg, proper bacon and excellent black pudding. Tip: if you arrive shortly before closing, these stalls are likely to offer you free extras.
Baxter's Cafe (Green Market) and the Malay and Thai curries at the Furness Fish stall (opposite Roast-To-Go) are also worth checking out. To drink, pick up a single-origin filter coffee from the fabulous Monmouth (from £1.35, 2 Park Street) or stop for a pint (from £3.40) at the Rake on Winchester Walk. This brilliant speciality beer bar – three real ale pumps and a 140-strong bottled beer selection – carries creations from many of the smaller London breweries, such as Meantime, Kernel, Redemption, Brodie's and Camden Town.
• Borough High Street, SE1 boroughmarket.org.uk
Southbank
Stretching for a mile or so along the Thames, the Southbank is home to many of London's key cultural attractions, including Tate Modern, the Royal National Theatre and the British Film Institute. It is not easy to eat well on a budget, here, but there are options if you get off the riverside promenade and explore the streets behind. The Table, a modern communal canteen space (83 Southwark Street, thetablecafe.com, mains from £6), serves real food made from real ingredients and is popular with office workers. Join them for excellent coffee (flat white, £2.50), or savoury tarts, salads and specials like roast organic chicken on preserved lemon couscous. From 13 May, on a site behind the Southbank Centre, the Real Food Market will go weekly (Fri-Sun), with stalls like Stewed & Baked, Bhangra Burger, Churros Garcia and the Arancini Brothers offering a variety of hot and cold takeaway food (£2-£5). Before then, from 29 April to 2 May, Real Food is hosting a one-off "street food" festival, including Pearl restaurant's Street Kitchen and the capital's favourite burger van, Meatwagon (themeatwagon.co.uk).
At the Globe theatre on Bankside (+44 (0)20-7928 9444, swanattheglobe.co.uk), meanwhile, Gordon Ramsay's former wingman, Mark Sargeant, has recently been revitalising the food. The brasserie restaurant, the Swan, is increasingly well-regarded and the ground-floor bar menu includes a limited number of affordable appetising dishes, such as Cotswold Legbar poached eggs on toast and a daily savoury tart with chips and salad (£5-£7), as well snacks like scotch eggs and sausages cooked in rioja (£4-£5).
Maltings Cafe, Tower Bridge
It is not exactly in-your-face, Maltings. Part of Maltings Place, a group of businesses housed in a former Sarson's vinegar factory, it is all but invisible from the street. But it's a find, with a restaurant and a deli-cafe. The broadly Italian restaurant menu includes pasta dishes at £4.75 and mains, such as a Neapolitan sausage and bean stew, for around £7. The Maltings' modus operandi is to buy in superior seasonal ingredients (as I arrived, so did a van from free-range and organic butcher, HG Walter), treat them simply and let them speak for themselves. The posh takeaway salad boxes live up to the billing. A piece of pan-fried skate wing atop a thoughtfully composed salad of new potatoes, chicory, herbs and leaves was fresh and piquant. The price? Just £4. The deli-cafe also serves excellent soups, sandwiches and baked goods.
• Sarsons Brewery Works, 169 Tower Bridge Road, SE1 +44 (0)20-7378 7961, maltingscafe.co.uk
Franco Manca, Brixton
The owners of Franco Manca, artist Bridget Hugo and restaurateur Giuseppe Mascoli, have redefined London's expectations of good pizza. The starter for their sourdough pizza bases dates from the 1700s; the brick pizza oven was built by an Italian craftsman using materials imported from Campania; the mozzarella is made to an Italian recipe on an organic farm in Somerset. The finished product is, unsurprisingly, ace: the blast-cooked bases are lively, elastic and beautifully charred, the tomato pulp is vivid. Simple adornments, like basil, are impeccably fresh and flavourful. Yet, prices remain low. A large tomato and mozzarella pizza is £5.75. Wash it down with a bottle of Sam Smith's organic lager (£2.95).
• Unit 4, Market Row, off Electric Lane, SW9 +44 (0)20-7738 3021, francomanca.co.uk
Rosie's, Brixton
The aforementioned Franco Manca may have grabbed the headlines, but Brixton Market has accumulated a number of interesting outlets, including Wild Caper, Ms Cupcake, Japanese restaurant, Curry Ono and the Goodbench coffee shop. Rosie Lovell's eponymous deli-cafe is another attraction. Foodies may recognise Lovell as the author of the cookery book Spooning With Rosie, which briefly saw her touted as "the new Nigella". Luckily for Brixton, Lovell is still here, doing her dynamic, creative thing. Her shop and cafe looks like the sort of cramped, slightly chaotic set-up you might stumble across in a village post office, but the food (sandwiches and salads from £3.50) is well-travelled, cosmopolitan stuff. Salads, such as a brilliant red pepper, dill and walnut oil tabbouleh, are a highlight. There are also pies, tarts, sausage rolls, one-pot meals and cakes.
• 14e Market Row, SW9 +44 (0)7807 505397, rosielovell.co.uk
Lido Cafe, Herne Hill
On a sunny day, Brockwell Lido's smartly renovated cafe is a fine location for breakfast, lunch or just a slice of fresh, fragrant carrot cake (£2.85). Sit out on the patio overlooking the sparkling pool or in the stark, bright interior while chowing on Stornoway black pudding and roast tomatoes on toast, homemade burgers and fishcakes, or Denhay cheddar macaroni cheese. This is one of a number of venues serving a sustainable mackerel bap with tartare sauce inspired by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Fish Fight. Unfortunately, while there are many good things going on here, a sample flat white was disappointing (£2).
• Breakfast £1.80-£8.60, light/ full meals, £3.65-£8.50. Dulwich Road, SE24 (+44 (0)20 7737 8183, thelidocafe.co.uk)
Dosa n Chutny, Tooting and Croydon
If you didn't know it by reputation, you might easily walk straight past Dosa n Chutny. It is more cafe than restaurant, a basic space with a few pictures of some of the dishes taped to the walls. The menu includes standard tandoor oven and curry dishes, but Dosa specialises in South Indian cooking, which is renowned for its relative lightness and sensitive spicing. Made from a finely-ground rice and lentil batter mix fried on a flat griddle like a crepe, the eponymous dosas are staggeringly good, as are the accompaniments: a liquidised, frothy and refreshing green coconut "chutney", and a sambar best described as a tamarind, tomato and lentil dahl cooked down into a thick, fragrant gravy. A sample dosa filled with mutton, onion and potato is almost like a south Indian Sunday dinner, the impeccable light, crisp dosa akin to the perfect Yorkshire pudding. It's big and filling and a very reasonable £4.25. Friendly, welcoming staff, too.
• Filled dosa, £2.95-£4.25, curry with rice, £4-£7. 68 Tooting High Street, SW17 (+44 (0)20 8767 9200, dosanchutny.co.uk)
Mirch Masala, Tooting, Croydon, Norbury and various other London locations
You can explore several strands of subcontinental cooking in Tooting, so, after Dosa n Chutny, why not walk up to this Pakistani favourite? Mirch is another no-frills affair with prices to match across its menu of tandoor-grilled meats and karahi curries. It is always a good sign when you can smell your lamb chops (£6) before you see them, and, as the far end of the room filled with a bluish smoke haze, I had high hopes. The chilli and herb marinade on them was fairly rudimentary, but the chops themselves were meaty and edged with a thick ridge of sweet carbonised fat, and left a pleasant tingle on the lips. Elsewhere on the menu, regulars rave over the karahi fish and the deigi dahl gosht, a marrow-infused dish of lentils and lamb cooked on the bone. No alcohol, BYO permitted.
• Starters £1.20-£8, mains with rice £6-£13. 213 Upper Tooting Road, SW17 (+44 (0)208 672 7500, mirchmasalarestaurant.co.uk)
The Breadstall, Clapham
There is much to interest the cash-strapped gourmet on Northcote Road. The Draft House serves interesting plates like ox tongue fritters alongside 18 draught beers, the well-reviewed Lola Rojo is doing three tapas for £8.50 and the local butcher, Hennessy's, is worth a browse. Pick of the bunch, however, is Sebastian Vince's Breadstall, two black bakery wagons that do a fine line in baguettes, pizza slices, upmarket rustic quiches and fabulous cakes. A sample warm chicken and ham (£3.50) pie is fully loaded with tasty hunks of the advertised ingredients. A Portuguese pastel de nata tart (£1.20) is exemplary. That day's specials, a beef, red wine and thyme stew, and a chorizo and chestnut soup, sounded equally appetising.
• Savoury snacks £2-£4. On the street, outside 60 Northcote Road, SW11 (+44 (0)7966 916 760)
Mien Tay, Battersea and Shoreditch
Even before the food arrives, I'm impressed. After I popped in to order a takeaway, the waiter asks if I would like to sit in the restaurant, rather than the hot, stuffy suntrap waiting area, before, unprompted, bringing over a glass of water and bowl of prawn crackers. Now, that is proper hospitality. The original Mien Tay in Shoreditch is often talked of as being one of the most distinctive Vietnamese restaurants on Kingsland Road's "pho mile", and this Battersea spin-off is equally impressive. A beef ball and brisket pho noodle soup is a memorable cavalcade of flavours and textures. The noodles are toothsome, while the remarkable broth has somehow taken on the heady flavours of a chai or jasmine tea. But while those phos are a filling bargain at around £6, the starters are probably best avoided if you are counting the pennies. A dish of honey 'n' spice marinated chargrilled quail tastes fine, but the four pieces of quail in the box (about two-thirds of the whole bird) aren't much to go at for £5.20.
• Various lunch dishes £5, pho £5.50-£6.80, 180 Lavender Hill, Battersea, SW11 (+44 (0)207 350 0721; mientay.co.uk)
Tony travelled from Manchester to London with Virgin Trains (virgintrains.co.uk)
