London has gone crazy for Mexican market eating.  Opened in 2007, there are now two Wahacas and a third is on the way in chain-mad Canary Wharf.  So, how do former Masterchef winner Thomasina Miers and business partner Mark Selby fare?  Well it took three attempts (damn those no reservations policies) but one Wednesday night after work we finally got a table for two in the heart of the Covent Garden restaurant. Having won the first battle, we were ushered to the bar and encouraged to order a drink to pass the 35 minute wait for our table.  If that doesn’t sound  like a great start, the hibiscus margaritas (and classic margarita, and another hibiscus margarita) that were presented more than made up for it.

As the last drops of margarita were drained, the black device we had been handed started to vibrate. Yippee! Our table was (finally) ready. Walking through the restaurant, it has a cheery feel to it.  The colours are bright and warm. The tables are filled with friends catching up, colleagues enjoying a quick meal, students chattering away.

Once seated, it was time for the tricky process of ordering.  The menu is helpfully divided into small plates for sharing (tacos, tostadas and quesadillas) and larger platos fuertes (enchiladas, burritos and grilled dishes).  We settled on the first option but what to choose – the “messy but delicious tacos”, “light and more-ish tostadas” or “velvety melting quesadilla”?  In the end, we tried them all.

The dishes were a mixed bag.  The bestseller, pork pibil (slow cooked pork in a Yucatecan marinade) and beef salpicón (shredded beef with spicy habanero and red onion salsa) were instant hits. The chorizo and  potato quesadillas were less appetising, especially for my companion who only announced a dislike for re-fried beans once we were seated. That’s a tricky one in a Mexican restaurant. And yes, almost every dish is garnished with the little blighters. Oh dear.  Two more margaritas, please!

It’s difficult to get away from the idea that this will be the Mexican answer to Wagamama or Carluccio’s.  Before we know it, there will be a Wahaca on every street corner. But is that a bad thing?  It’s a cheap night out, with a good cocktail and lively atmosphere. That’s ok, isn’t it?

Wahaca, 66 Chandos Place, Covent Garden, London WC2N 4HG, Tel: +44 20 7240 1883, coventgarden@wahaca.co.uk

Pity poor Monsieur: he’s the one responsible for my love of Mexican food, the complex moles, the cactus salads (hold the spines) and the juicy ceviches. Yet Monsieur wasn’t with me at Wahaca last Thursday, for a much looked-forward to evening with Thomasina Miers, the Executive Chef and co-owner of London’s Mexican street food sensation, Wahaca.

Along with a couple of dozen perpetually-hungry fellow-Qypers, I was invited to Wahaca in the mammoth Westfield shopping centre to test the new season’s ‘Cold Months’ menu. With sharpened teeth and notebook at the ready (but no camera, where on earth was my camera?) we listened as Tommi explained the dishes we were about to try. Then I had the great good fortune of sitting next to her. Tommi was nothing less than the perfect hostess, juggling gastronomic inquisition from guests with managing the event and staff. It looked effortless, but I’m sure it wasn’t. This is a woman with (invisible) nerves of steel. She won Masterchef after all, something Tommi admits was scary, propelling her into the world of professional cooking. Then, two years ago, the first Wahaca was born in Covent Garden, a new take on Mexican street food with reasonable prices and a no reservations policy.

Tommi’s Wahaca business partner, Mark Selby, also joined us last night. Equally affable, he welcomed us all as we arrived, work-weary but excited to spend an evening with he and Tommi and a kitchen doling out delicious Mexican food. It’s evident that in business, Mark and Tommi are well-matched.

The Westfield Wahaca opened with the mammoth London shopping centre last year, but once through its doors you’d never know it had neighbours like Debenhams and other high street stores. Its atmosphere is slightly sultry with dimmed lighting, functional wooden furniture and bursts of  colour. The patrons themselves add splash and vibrance to the space, each bottle of tabasco or plate of taquitos or stack of Mexican bean cans or chunky hand-blown glass of margarita with salted rim enhancing the overall vibe of originality. Yes, I like it here.

Now onto the important part – eating. Tommi asked us for honest feedback, to find out whether or not the new menu would work. Would it be good enough to serve to her public?

First up were smoked herring tostadas served with a squeeze of fresh lime. The smokiness stayed in my mouth for a minute or so afterward, which is a very good thing because I love smoky flavours, especially with fish.

We looked on, bemused, as bowls of feta, tortillas, coriander and avocado were smothered by jugfuls of black bean soup. Then, taking our Tommy Tippee-style plastic spoons, dipped into the muddy mix, we sucked our spoons clean of the dark and spicy creaminess. It looked so wrong but tasted surprisingly good, if a little heavy on the heat at our end of the table. Usually I’d never order such a pond of bubbling mud with mystery ingredients concealed within its depths so this was a surprise for me. Yes, it was good but no, I probably wouldn’t order it again, at least, not unless I was sharing my slurps with a rugby team. It was served in bowls of a size that even sharing between four of us, we barely dented the surface. Perhaps if the bowls were smaller I’d be keener? No, there are plenty of other options at Wahaca to delight me so I’ll pass on the black bean soup for now, but it did create some interesting debate about coriander (like it or loathe it?) and spoons.

“I like the spoons,” said one Qyper.

“Yes, everyone likes them.” Tommi agreed, “so much so that we’ve had to put  a spoon amnesty on our blog.”

“A spoon what?”

“A spoon amnesty. So many people take them home in their handbags that we’ve had to offer an amnesty so people can bring them back.”

I can see why. They were dotted about our tables – sturdy, and ergonomically comfortable to hold in their pretty baby colours of lime, raspberry and sky blue, but no, I did not take home my spoon, although I’d be interested to know where to buy my own set, just to add a touch of fun to the dining table at home.

The huitacoche (corn fungus), field mushroom and cheese quesadillas, folded into warm triangles, were winter-warming and delicious. With a dab or two of red salsa, I thought “I’ve just found my new comfort food!” Yes, this time I had seconds, but that was silly, really, because there was so much more yet to taste.

There were soft corn tortillas topped with shredded slaw, goujons of Baja California fish and a zingy drizzle of chipotle mayo. As an A-FISH-ionado, myself, I can smile and say these were good. Very, very good. I enjoyed the winter salad of butternut squash and spelt, with pickled hibiscus flowers and orange to sweeten the combination and chilli and radish to warm it. The baked pollock was also tasty, flaking into tender tomato-infused morsels; this would certainly take the bite out of a chill winter’s day, although by this point I was slowing down my intake so that by the time we got to the burritos, I didn’t have  stomach enough remaining to comment on whether the cabbage in it detracted from the overall texture or flavour, one of the debates taking place amongst this avid crowd of food lovers.

Concerning the bar contents at Wahaca, usually I’d jump right in and order one of their delicious margaritas, but tonight I accepted the offer of a Modelo Especial beer with fresh lime. It was a very pleasant lager indeed. Then, as the food arrived, the wine was poured – red or white. I chose white, but couldn’t tell you more than that, apart from the fact that somehow, when my back was turned or perhaps when I was paying more attention to something that was about to enter my stomach, my water glass was filled with wine, too. So when I went to have a gulp of water after a particularly spicy bite of something, I managed to down half a glass of wine before I realised what it was. That was a truly dumb Epicurienne moment. I’ll be more cautious in future!

Under Mark’s guidance, we tasted three tequilas from the Wahaca stable: a Blanco (white), served cold, a Reposado (rested) served at room temperature and an Añejo (aged), also served at room temperature, with a lovely, caramelly tang. As many will confide, I, too, have had the occasional clash with tequila, but the selection we enjoyed last night was an utterly different sensory experience to student union layback sessions in a vintage dentist’s chair. This was refined, smooth, flavoursome liquid, to be sipped and savoured, not consumed in one swallow. This was tequila for grown ups and it was better than good. Click here to find out more.

But now I was flagging. The past few weeks have been hell at work, the stress of it strangely absorbing all appetite along the way and causing sleep to be elusive. Last night it picked its time to catch up with me and I had to leave the party early in order to catch some much needed zzzzs. But first, churros. What a delightful end to this tasty respite of an evening – dipping doughnut fingers into molten chocolate. How very Willy-Wonka-Does-Mexico it was. After a few wicked bites of churro and a quick word to TikiChris and Mel Seasons, I left Domestic Sluttery table-mate, Alex and Qyper Jessica to enjoy my espresso because I had to leave, lest I face-planted into my salsas, which would have been very poor form indeed.

**Huge thanks must go to Tommi and Mark, and all the Wahaca staff who helped this week’s event to be such a success, including those hardworking, unseen folk in the kitchen. Everyone was kind, patient with our neverending questions, and generous to the hilt. Thank you, thank you, thank you all.

***And because I was a complete doofus, not being able to find my camera, which was all the time hiding in the bottom of my idiotically-deep handbag, TikiChris has kindly allowed me to use his photos for Qype of the Wahaca event. Chris is a talented photographer, second to none. To see the rest of his Wahaca pics, click here. And to offer Chris a fabulous photographic assignment (because he’s so worth it) you can tweet him @tikichris

OTHER USEFUL LINKS

Wahaca blog

Qype

My last review of Wahaca

On Friday I went with Lady Friend to the Open Studio in Bow, opposite Bow Church. I’d never been here before, but as it turns out its where my friend Anna has her arts charity project and it’s just around the corner from Toby’s flat. So I should know it, but there you go, I’m always unfashionable late knowing about these sorts of things. It was a lovely warm summer evening, crowds of arty people where eating Thai food (so did I: it wasn’t bad) and quaffing booze. We wandered through the rabbit warren of studio spaces admiring or ignoring the good, the bad and the just plain old rubbish. Most of the pieces were of the styles and of a standard you’d expect at such an event: solidly modernist, sometimes avent garde, a mixture of paintings, bits of stuff stuck to other bits of stuff, angry embroidery, some portraiture designed to be hung in the modern equivalent of ‘Athena’. A bit like a degree show at a decent uni art school, but with less photography and none of those annoying video instillations that are always crap.

In the midst of this was the work of Corinne Felgate and Mark Selby. I don’t know if these too are connected in anyway, but they shared a space at this exhibition and an over all sense of fun in their works. I never expected to find something that would engage me in the way these piece did. It’s very difficult to write about art with out describing it, and my golden rule of blogging is never describe or retell plot: the reader can experience this for themselves, it serves no purpose. What I can say is that both seem to specialise (at the moment) in visual puns. I like puns. I like visual puns: y’know, Man Rays iron with nails, that sort of thing. It’s very difficult to make this sort of thing with out it being throw-away and unsubstantial. Most of this sort of thing gets 5 mins of ‘oh isn’t that nice’ before moving on. One piece is a roughly made wooden chair with a fan in the seat, called ‘Hot Seat’. Get it? Yes, it works on one level, but there is underlying sense of practicality to this and his other piece. You find your laughter mellowing and then asking yourself ‘I wonder if it would work?’. It did – I cooled my hot bottom nicely on it. His other work was ‘Mobile Phone’: a trolley with two tin cans joined by string. Rosie and I spent a happy five minutes talking to each other. You see it works. It worked it getting us to interact with each other, to talk, to be aware of the act of communication, something that ‘real’ mobile phones have maybe robbed us of. ‘If I Was A Painter’ by Connie Felgate are some half empty paint tubes splurging paint on a floor. You see – bald descriptions serve little purpose. It’s a clever joke; She is a painter, and these aren’t paints. They are a reconstruction of paints. Following so far? No? Don’t care? What ever, it’s funny, and genuinely funny art is a rare and wonderful thing. These days art is a common thing – if, like me you live in the east of London you can’t walk down the street with out being accosted by someone’s art (this is literally true). Its very rare in this proliferation that genuinely good, creative and fun works are made that feel warm and playful. The viewer is involved with Mark’s works, interact with them, and in some you become part of them. Corrine’s pieces require you to think about what you are looking at in a decidedly non-passive way, again what you bring to the work matters. These two artists are in some sense a two person movement that brings the humanity back to art and gives you a smile as well as making you think. Check out their links on my blogrole —>