A short walk from Tower Bridge, Maltby Street Market's set into the railway arches and bursting to the seams with the newest street food on the scene. We headed down a Sunday or so ago, chasing the sun as it attempted to break through the April clouds. It's a little shady down the Ropewalk at times but the warmth of the stalls and the bustle of people will keep you from getting too cold.
First off, make sure you take a stroll along the entire length of the market before making up your mind on what to try first. There's everything from scotch eggs and sausage rolls, Greek pittas and Indian wraps and even raclette on offer and you'll be hard pressed to make a decision.
We kicked off with grilled cheese sandwiches from the guys at The Cheese Truck. The three-strong team were the image of efficiency as the orders came thick and fast - supply somehow always kept up with demand, and boy were these boys in demand. We went for the goats cheese with honey, walnuts and rosemary butter - a sweet and savoury melt-in-the-mouth sensation with the rich flavours tripping over each other brilliantly in the mouth and squidging deliciously out between the toast - and the Cropwell Bishop stilton with bacon and pear chutney. This one was salty with a real bite from the blue, added meatiness from the pig and a little sugar to round it all off. The Metro called them the 'best street food truck ever'. An accolade I could get on board with.
We ate our grilled cheese perched on empty barrels between old planks and railway sleepers stacked high at Maltby & Greek, a tiny little shop who find the best food and drink from Greece. We didn't sample any of their cured meats but the glass of red wine was, naturally, delicious.
From there, we couldn't resist the call of the king crab mac & cheese toasted brioche sandwich from DoYouCrab. Piled high with pasta, sprinkled with parmesan and topped with chilli and coriander, this oozing delight was a riot of flavours and by far one of the best things I've ever parted money with at a market.
Of course, we couldn't resist having something to wash them down with and snapped up a highly coveted spot at Little Bird Gin, a craft gin distillery. We kicked off with two Red Snappers each which came in weighty jugs with lashings of horseradish and spice, much to the envy of practically everyone who walked past.
Then, we tried the 'Perfect G&T' - their gin with Fever Tree tonic with a large slice of pink grapefruit (not too base), the Early Bird Martini - gin, cointreau, marmalade and pink grapefruit juice (tangy and fruity), the Barrel Aged Negroni - gin, Martini Rosso and oak barrel aged Campari (deliciously naughty and complete with a Little Bird) and the Whoops-A-Daisy - gin & orange liqueur, pomegranate, lemon and soda water (sweet and sherbety). So, essentially the entire menu plus another G&T each. Not bad going for the two of us, of course.
Places like Maltby Street Market remind me of the sheer creativity of street food and stalls. There's a hell of lot of passion put into these tiny pop-up places and whatever you're in the mood for, there's always something new to fall in love with.
Maltby Street Market's open 9am to 4pm on Saturdays & 11am to 4pm Sundays. You'll find it at SE1 3PA.
(top photo via as too busy munching again)
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