Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town - Wigwambam - Kimchinary

It's been a slow week venturing out for The List thanks to another fun London tube strike, so I'm considering spending next week in Dawlish or Sochi to get away from it all.  Who's with me?

Friday 31st January - In a simpler time, when certain employees of TFL decided to actually do their job, I made my way over to Liverpool Street to try out a few places, starting with a trip to see the Mayor.

The Breakfast Club started life in Soho back in 2005 but has since spread its wings to Angel, Hoxton, Spitalfields and Battersea.  The Spitalfields branch was the first to get on the speakeasy train with their hidden bar, The Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town.  When it first opened, you needed to ask to see the Mayor before being led through a Smeg Fridge to the downstairs bar but this formality seems to have disappeared over time.  

Depending on when you arrive, you may face a short wait in The Breakfast Club itself (which is one good looking place), or if you time it really badly, a queue around the block!  The Breakfast Club gets extremely busy for weekend brunch, so The Mayor opens up from 12pm on Saturdays & Sundays to serve more brunch behind the fridge - a late weekend afternoon might be your best bet for getting in straight away.

We rocked up at 6.30 last Friday and there was only standing space available, but before too long we squeezed into two seats at the bar - the only place one should ever sit in a cocktail bar.  Not only do you get the most out of the entertaining bartenders, you also get the best view of the eye-catching decor.

Cocktails are £9 with the exception of the £11 King Yellowman's Answer which won the Rumfest 2012 cocktail competition with its tempting mix of pineapple, Blackwell rum, pear juice, lime juice and coffee, topped off with a flaming, over-proof rum filled scotch bonnet.  Click here to see Mayoress Kate Jackson take you through the recipe.  

Golden Hind was an interesting blend of Kamm & Son's (Gingseng spirit), gin, lemon, red grapes, sage, ginger and fresh apple.  Our entertaining barman gleefully added in The King's Ginger liqueur in the absence of fresh ginger, but to be honest it could have done with even more booze as it was almost too drinkable.  A refreshing Spitalfields Spritz with Aperol, coriander, bitter lemon and Prosecco also disappeared very quickly.  I highly recommend Tommy's Chilli & Lemongrass Margarita having had it previously elsewhere.  I might go for the chicken-filtered mezcal next time I'm in.

For the most part, the cocktail list is simple but solid, allowing the buzzing atmosphere to take centre stage. Get in early on weekdays (it opens at 5pm), order some of the Mayor's cat food, and don't forget to leave via the My Little Pony / He-Man wallpapered toilets to preserve the hidden entrance feel.

If you want The Breakfast Club cocktails without the worry of waiting, try out The King of Ladies Man in Battersea, their relaxed 70s bachelor pad bar tucked away behind a fake laundrette -great for disco drinks, interesting bottled beers, and any food that revolves around cheese (order the Smokey Joe Mac n Cheese). Watch this space for details on their next branch in London Bridge which will be opening soon complete with a tequila-driven "Mr Lucky" bar somewhere inside.

For our second stop, I decided to revisit one of my favourite popups from 2013 - Wigwambam on the roof of Queen of Hoxton.  If you make it past the unnecessary bouncer, through the sticky ground floor and up several flights of stairs, you will be rewarded with one of London's coolest (and hottest) hangouts.  It gets pretty busy, but if you can't pack into the boiling wigwam (heated by a massive central BBQ) then you can spill out on to the attractive open air rooftop space.

It is almost identical to last year's popup with the addition of some Nordic inspired "Eastern Lights" visuals which are projected on to the interior and exterior of the wigwam. Hot drinks are still good value at £5.50 / £6 - sadly there was Pumpkin Spiced Cider left, but hot buttered rum and hot gin punch hit the spot.  Every day something different is cooked on the central BBQ, and the Crispy Pork Leg with Chestnut and Herb Stuffing smelled fantastic.  You can also get yourself 5 marshmallows for a pound to roast over the open fire.

The Wigwambam website has this mysterious message:

"If you have a keen eye, be prepared to unearth a discovery of your own elsewhere on the rooftop. Explorer, Arthur Lane has made his mark on the Queen of Hoxton and it’s up to you to tweet your findings for fellow pioneers to uncover too..."  

I'm pretty sure this amounts to free drinks tokens hidden around the tent - let me know if you find any!  The website also states that there are several "Drink and Do" events including spoon carving, pinhole photography, speed listening (?), pumpkin carving and origami workshops - check the Facebook site for details.  Even more exciting, you can hire the whole place out by sending an email to jennie@mothershipgroup.com

We resisted the crispy pork leg and made our way over to the Catch Bar at the Hoxton end of Kingsland Road.  Catch is a lively little bar which is making a name for itself with top food residencies.  All last year, Death by Burrito were in the house serving up contemporary Mexican street food alongside a Ryan Chetiyawardana (White Lyan) cocktail list.  Now the keys to the kitchen have been handed over to KERB regulars Kimchinary for at least 3 months, every Wednesday-Sunday.

Hanna Soderlund is the crafty chef behind Kimchinary and has brought her popular Korean / Mexican tacos and some exciting side dishes to Shoreditch.  Meanwhile Catch have put on a flavour paired drinks menu of Korean Soju and British Craft Beers.  We had to wait a few minutes for a table, so we started off with pints of the local Pressure Drop Pale Fire and resisted the urge not to belt out some of the wonderfully cheesy tunes that Catch were playing.

As soon as we were seated we got stuck into the tacos (£6 for two) which arrived almost as soon as we ordered them! Each one is a work of art but you won't be able to look at them for long without stuffing them in your face. We all went for different approaches for minimising mess but this is not a knives & forks meal. We started with Gojuchang Pulled Pork with apple & sesame coleslaw, house kimchi and chives.  This ended up being our favourite and the portions got bigger and bigger as we ordered more!   

Best looking taco of the night goes to the Buttermilk Fried Squid with celeriac & radicchio remoulade and kimchi guacamole - delicious.  

The "Bulgogi" Ox Cheek and Tongue taco with radish kimchi, blackened spring onion and horseradish wasn't as photogenic, but it was no less tasty.  Dukbokki was the standout side option - a sweet and spicy bowl of squishy gnocchi-esque Korean rice cakes with rainbow chard and rainbow shallots.  The Kimchi Chimichanga was also superb - don't be put off by the "mini burrito" description, the portion size is generous for a £4.50 side.

We washed all of Hanna's wonderful creations down with various craft beers, including the fine trio pictured above - Five Points Pale, Crate Golden Lager and Beavertown 8 Ball.  As it was a Friday night, many seemed to be just in for drinks but hopefully got peckish after a couple of beverages.  The food arrives so quickly that you can just keep ordering as you go.  The Catch Bar waitresses were very efficient and friendly, as was Hanna who we had a couple of chats with.  

Special mention has to go to one excellent member of Catch staff who was very helpful moving us around to different tables as our numbers expanded, and even did a little dance number for us to demonstrate that they were clearing space on the dance floor.  They certainly have some bizarre customers to deal with, including a couple who decided a busy bar was the best place to have sex, and a pushy pair who tried to nip in and sit on our table when we were standing over it.

Anyway, go and check out Kimchinary at Catch Bar (Wednesday-Sunday) as soon as you can - 3 months will fly by before you know it.  You can also find Hanna and her team at Kerb street food events.

The Breakfast Club - King of Ladies Man - Homeslice Pizza

Wednesday 15th May - The Breakfast Club has finally ventured south of the river!  I booked a table for 6.30 and assembled a SW London team of Ali, Max, Libby and Mary for dinner and drinks.  As I was early, I popped in to the nearby Southsider Cocktail Club (one of my first List trips a few months ago) to check out their new cocktail menu.  They have one of the best happy hours in London with £5 top of the range cocktails from 5-8 every day.  New drinks include syringes, tea cups and even one in a plastic coffee cup.  I couldn't leave without tasting their homemade pesto bitters (slightly obsessed with the green stuff) which was tasty but incredibly dry.  The free chilli and lime flavoured popcorn went down well too.

Southsider Classic - Blueberry Pancake Mule
Photo from Cocktail Scholars

Libby hauled me out of the bar and we arrived first at the new Battersea Breakfast Club.  The decor is not as rock'n'roll hipster as the other branches, perhaps in an attempt to appease the Clapham yuppies.  My main reason for coming was not however for the food (though I need to return for the proper brunch experience, queues and all, on a Sunday in the near future)...  The Spitalfields Breakfast Club has a hidden bar called the Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town, which you enter by walking through a giant Smeg fridge.  That's all well and good, but now I no longer need to hop on the 344 to Liverpool Street to get my breakfast & cocktail fix in the same place.  The Battersea branch has its own secret called King of Ladies Man - a 70s bachelor pad serving disco drinks, grilled cheese sandwiches and craft beers.  Bar descriptions don't come much better than that.  They had some private openings over the weekend, with invites sent out on knickers - see below! 

King of Ladies Man invites

We decided to build the anticipation by ordering some Breakfast Club food first, though I had blogger paranoia that the bar would fill up as I saw people disappearing in the right direction.  Our waiter was a laugh, especially when he vented his frustration with using the electronic notepads  for taking orders, as they make it hard to have any eye contact with customers.  We challenged him to keep eye contact with Ali as he took note of her Full English order, and he made a good fist of it.     Thankfully the food came quickly as I was getting more and more worried about the bar filling up.  We all somehow resisted ordering the Cow vs Pig burger.  My pulled pork sandwich was very enjoyable, and Ali seemed pretty happy with her maple syrup covered fry up.  After wolfing everything down, we asked the manager to take us through to see the King.  She obliged and showed us to the door which lead to a laundrette (no doubt for all of the King's dirty laundry).

Here we were greeted with a free round of Taboo shots (remember that drink?) by a man in a Hawaiian shirt, sporting a King of Ladies Man (KOLM) shirt transfer.  He then slid back one of the walls to reveal the KOLM bar.  We were shown to a fun corner of the bar, which worked its way around so that we were effectively standing behind the bar in line with the staff.  We were well looked after by Sam who brought us our first round of disco drinks.  Another barman also came by asking if we were expecting a surprise.  We weren't but by this point he had got our hopes up so he went to get us more free shots since he had put his foot in it.

Max wore the right jumper for the occasion

The drinks menu is cleverly presented in the form of the King's Little Black Book, with plenty of blank pages at the back for leaving your number for him.  The craft beers aren't listed in the menu as they going to rotate them, but they are all on show above the bar.  The array of cheesy bar food looks excellent and they serve food til 10.  Ali would like better marked toilet doors after she went to the Men's by mistake, though she did fail to see the urinals opposite her as she went in.  There are loads of classic cocktails plus some new inventions to choose from and each one we went for on the night went down very well.  We had to try a taster of the seaweed-infused Zubrowka - what can I say, it tasted like seaweed-infused Zubrowka.  It blended very nicely with tequila in the drinkable Mr.Miyagi house cocktail.  Tommy's Chilli and Lemongrass Margarita and the Mezcal Sunset were also particularly impressive.  All this was set to a funky soundtrack that was right up my street (Earth, Wind and Fire, Average White Band, Jackson 5 etc) though it did veer slightly off course every now and then - stick to disco funk! When we eventually left, I asked to take the above photo of the laundrette, which inadvertedly led to yet another round of Taboo shots.  The staff were great value all night and gave the place a friendly but lively atmosphere.  There is no better time to go to KOLM than tonight, as they are doing a ridiculous "Helsinki Happy Hour" from 4-8pm (as it will be 6pm in Helsinki) with drinks served at 80s prices! I hope it becomes a regular Friday occurrence. The King will definitely be getting a second date...

Tuesday 14th - Before watching Arsenal vs Wigan in the bottled beer heaven that is Porterhouse, I met my fellow Gallery String Quartet member, Tom (feel free to leave viola jokes as comments below), for some pizza at the newly opened Homeslice Pizza in the colourful Neal's Yard near Covent Garden.

Homeslice (or Homelice as I called them a month ago on The List before my Dad corrected me) have upgraded from selling pizza by the slice on the street by moving in to a new permanent home which opened last week.  You can still order by the slice for £4, or you can order giant 20" pizzas to share for £20, with the option of going half and half on toppings.  The different combinations are all up on our board and it is not an easy choice!

We decided upon the Bone Marrow, Spring Onion and Watercress opposite the Duck Breast with Roasted Szechuan Pineapple which the waitress highly recommended.  The monster pizza arrived quickly with a pizza cutter which Tom wielded despite having a broken elbow, leaving us with some giant slices to eat calzone style.  The doughy base and crust were very moreish and the toppings were superb.  We washed it down with a pint of Saint Lager but there is also the superior (though more expensive) Kernel Pale Ale available in bottles.  It was already busy by 6.30 and it has only been open a week so get there as early as you can!  They do take bookings for larger groups too.  

Stuff to book: Ginstock and Craft Beer Battle, both excellent sounding events run by Tweat Up; Forza Win - rooftop pizza supper club with entertainment; Rooftop Film Club - new branch in Peckham opening soon.

Natalie remains List Leader though may be caught by Sam as she continues to weigh up whether to spend all her money on gin or save it for a house.  Judging by her purchasing of Ginstock tickets yesterday, she should be able to maintain her lead.

Crown and Shuttle - 5cc - Beigel Bake

Saturday 13th - Shoreditch trip #4 got underway with a couple of drinks in Wigwambam with Natalie.  I'm quite proud of myself for revisiting somewhere from The List when I have so many places left to try out!  We tried their hot drinks - hot toddy, hot buttered rum and mulled cider - which all hit the spot, before moving off to the Crown and Shuttle round the corner. Wigwambam will be making way for Rooftop Film Club soon. Get booking for that if you are interested!

The Crown and Shuttle reopened its doors on 5th April so it had only been open a week when we visited.  It started off as a Victorian pub in 1865, but in the 1990s it became a shabby strip club which was eventually boarded up in 2001.  It looks fantastic now (retaining the original strippers pole for old times sake) and has a great selection of beers - in bottles, on tap and in barrels at the back.  There is also a lovely big garden with a food truck serving up a whole host of tasty treats.  It's a very handy place to start off a night in Shoreditch - you might find yourself still there several hours later.

The main event of the evening was a trip to another new pub, The Well and Bucket, which reopened a few weeks ago, 24 years after it shut it 1989.  Here too there is an exciting array of beers spread around an attractive central bar, but the crowds have already discovered it.  It was truly unpleasant just to be in there for a minute.  Luckily, a minute was all we needed because we weren't going to the pub itself.  We went straight downstairs to find the hidden cocktail bar, 5cc.

5cc felt like home after forcing through the pub crowds upstairs.  We had a table ready, jazz was playing in the background and waitresses were competing to serve us!  We were joined by Sam, Ali, Olly and James (on his List début).  There are some interesting bottled beers (we enjoyed local Crate Lager) but the cocktails are the reason to come.  The Last Word and Smokey Tommy particularly stood out of the ones we tried.  The 5cc barman passed Ali's mocktail test, making her a mojito-ish drink that was good enough to make her buy another.  There are also bottle-aged cocktails and vintage spirits available to try.  If you are peckish, you can order in some oysters.  Sam and I were tempted by one that was wrapped in bacon, creamed leeks and crushed hazelnuts, but we decided to hold off on food until a bit later.

We had a very relaxing stay, especially in comparison to our experience of the chaos upstairs.  It was amusing to see pub-goers discovering the bar by mistake on their way to the toilets, and trying to talk their way in for a quick drink.  I only managed to get a 2 hour slot having booked a few days in advance, so get organised if you want to stay there all evening.  There is another 5cc hidden beneath The Exmouth Arms if you don't have any luck booking in to the Shoreditch branch.

Ali, James and Olly headed off home leaving Sam, Natalie and I to search for food.  We started to wander towards Hawksmoor Spitalfields to sample the downstairs bar food, but we got distracted by Beigel Bake on the way.  Beigel Bake is a Brick Lane institution - this traditional Jewish bakery is open 24 hours a day, and is always busy with a mix of hipsters, taxi drivers and locals (who use it as a proper bakery rather than a late night food joint).  For ravenous hipsters, the best option is the enormous hot salt beef beigel with mustard.

Whilst queuing, you will inevitably order some of their pastries, especially when a doughnut is only 30p.  Natalie cleverly ordered a buttered beigel to pass the time until her other beigel was ready, whilst Sam devoured the Salmon and Cream Cheese variety in preparation for his.  I bought two puddings just because it seemed silly not to when everything is so cheap.  This should definitely be your first port of call when in need of late night food in Shoreditch.  You have to feel sorry for the empty Beigel shop next door though!

We walked down towards Liverpool Street to head home and briefly dropped in to The Breakfast Club on Artillery Lane.  We were too late to get in to The Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town speakeasy downstairs through the giant fridge, but we stayed for some milkshakes and a sticky toffee pudding (my third dessert of the evening).  I will need to return for a proper brunch before I count this place as ticked off, and a trip through the fridge is also required.  The Breakfast Club can also be found in Hoxton, Angel and Soho.  I am very excited that they are opening a new branch in Battersea, complete with a hidden bar called The King of Ladies Man.  The name is apparently a famous line in 'Cheers' and the bar will have a 70s bachelors pad feel, serving up craft beers and disco drinks from midday until late.

Full of beigels and puddings, we parted company instead of continuing on to Sushisamba round the corner. Natalie picks up 4 more Team List points, Sam gets 3, and Olly, James and Ali pick up 1.  Every little helps! This puts Natalie in to a clear lead with 21 points so far, leaving behind Tim on 16 and Sam on 14. However,  I have been out since with Tim and Sam on separate occasions.  Can they overhaul Natalie's total?  Keep reading to find out!

Exciting popup alert: Midnight Apothecary - a rooftop cocktail bar on top of the Brunel museum in Rotherhithe open Saturdays and Sundays this Summer, starting on April 20th.