Half of August was spent out of the country, but I still squeezed in a decent amount of caffeine hits, carb loading sessions, and boozy adventures. There was a burger filled afternoon at Ben’s Canteen in Battersea, featuring their Brewdog collaboration burger and a Juicy Lucy goat number for National Burger Day. We also embarked a mini coffee crawl on the same stretch, taking in Story, Birdhouse and Devotion. At some point, I made it over to Tooting for a coffee at Milkteeth, the impressive new space from the folk behind Milk in Balham. A return visit is required for all the brunch.
There were more burgers and a sneak peek of the patty melt at Bleecker Burger, on the same night as a pretty disappointing meal at Ugly Dumpling in Soho. Another time, there was London Cheap Eats worthy Cacio e Pepe at Wolf near Broadgate Circle. On a rare sunny afternoon, Ali fired up a BBQ for his birthday, and we went full Argentinian asado with 1kg Ginger Pig picanha steaks and bottles of delicious Graffigna Malbec.
My good friend Sam at Park Road Kitchen opened his third site, in Clapham Common, for fresh salads, rotisserie chicken and epic lunch specials. I went along on the opening day to get some snaps – there are more on Flickr here. As usual, there were beers at The Bottle Shop in Bermondsey which is now open seven days a week – great news for craft beer geeks. Speaking of which, Matt The List won the Beer Blogging award at the inaugural Brewdog Beer Geek Awards, and a complimentary trip to Stockholm is on the horizon! It was fun evening at Brewdog Clerkenwell with far too many glasses of Alesmith Speedway Stout. P.S. Check out Beer & Present Danger for a good read, and Pint Sized for some YouTube lolz.
As I mentioned, there were also a couple of #MattTheTrips in August. A week in Brussels and Paris centred around the fantastic BXL Beerfest (full post here). I also had time to explore some more places for Map The List guides and future posts. Postcards | Brussels has been updated with recent photos and recommendations, and Paris will hopefully follow soon! My annual trip to the Edinburgh Fringe festival gave me a chance to get some more photos for Postcards | Edinburgh, and to add to my article on The Trossachs. Stay tuned for more Matt The Trips adventures – Vienna, Stockholm and the Amalfi Coast are all on the cards before Christmas.
