Hot Dinners was up in Soho bright and early this morning to see foodmarket impresario Henrietta Green preside over the launch of the new Foodlovers market on Rupert Street (just north of Shaftesbury Avenue). The unusual juxtaposition of sex shops and stallholders gave the market a perfectly Soho look and feel. Apparently it's been adopted already by several restaurateurs who are putting on special market dishes inspired by what's on offer - Polpo's Russell Norman was there first thing this morning, picking up bits and pieces.
We particularly liked the look of Madame Gautier's traiteur - the braised beef confit looked just the ticket to take away to save anyone having to slave over a hot stove today. Beas of Bloomsbury's stall looked a picture - as always - and the hog roast stall's sandwiches with rocket, cumin and apple sauce were porky slices of heaven.
We also sampled some great terrines from Market Gourmet - all of which come with a little pot of matching sauce, so pea puree with the rabbit terrine and parnsip puree for the ham hock terrine. And we picked up a bunch of sausages from Happy Herefords and Tipsy Tamworths and an absolutely massive chicken from Fosse Meadows Farm.
The markets will be held every Saturday between 9am and 4pm with a range of around 30 stalls, some permanent, some not - and there's also the opportunity for really niche food producers to just take on a bench or roam around with a basket of goodies. For more information go to the Foodlovers Market Soho website.
