London Made Us by Robert Elms

Author:Robert Elms
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canongate Books

Every Day I Take Coffee

with the Portuguesers

The finest little corner shop in Camden Town is run by a pair of charming brothers from the banks of the Douro. One reserved, slightly serious and kind, the other much more garrulous, jocular, prone to air guitar: both of them call me Mr Roberto. I talk to them in Spanish, which is clearly silly but it allows me to practise my second language; and they are Iberian after all, so they indulge me. Especially as I am often the first person in the shop at 8 a.m. looking for my breakfast shot.

We talk football, music, wine, have a good old gossip about local affairs, or just lark about. They make good and remarkably good value sandwiches on terrific, rustic Portuguese bread and get through vast piles of those fabulous pasteis de nata, the flaky custard tarts, which have become part of the London diet. But they are not monocultural; they stock other non-

Portuguese urban essentials like baklava, samosas and hummus.

It’s the sort of jumbled, overstocked shop where you can get just about anything you need, and somehow the staff know where everything is. The Fereira delicatessen, for that’s what it’s called, is open every day, starting early, closing late. You can even sit outside, and people do; tourists on the way to Regent’s Park, regulars who take a cup of something and a cake at the same time every day.

The coffee, made in a big old espresso machine, is served just as I like it: short, dark, sweet, cut with just a little hot but not frothy milk. In Spanish it’s called a cortado, so that’s what I ask for. My daily cortado, usually taken while chatting away, is one pound, it’s always been one pound and I hope it will always be one pound. This is definitely not a chain.

While I’m standing sipping from my polystyrene cup, families come in and pick up their vital supplies of bacalhau, that dried salt cod which looks skeletal, tastes fecal and no one but the Portuguese can stomach. Along with their smelly fish, they stock up on fresh figs, a baffling variety of tinned sardines, vinho verde wine, boxes of Omo and magazines devoted to the torrid love lives of Brazilian telenovela stars and pictures of Cristiano Ronaldo.

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