sarah
And me neither.. I lived a long time near the Dalston Ridley Road Market.... close on 20 yrs in fact. What an education!! I grew to love it to bits, and it's the first place I would head for on a trip back to the smoke.
I think the Turkish shop you went to is the twin sister of the one I knew and loved so well in Dalston - they have a branch there. Over the years I tried a lot of stuff from there.... fresh "mattress" bread, the whole gamut of the own-made pastries, the olives, the feta, the fresh honeycomb in slices, the rahat lakhoum (sp?), the lovely range of fruit juicesÑ becoming totally addicted to cherry juice aka Visne (the s has a cedilla that my Mac says it can't do but it's pronounced Vishne)... and a good few odd but oddly delicious tinned things esp dolmades and imam baylidi. Vegetarian friends outside London sent me shopping lists...
Their fresh fruit and veg was to die for...amazing range and nothing but first clbutt fresh. Never found anywhere else you could get huge bunches of fresh dill or purslane, globe artiechokies, green hazelnuts, cheap watermelons and papayas any time of year.
Used to eat at the Kurdish community centre restaurant in Stokey Cokey. Soooo cheap, all cooked to order, delicious. Have not had a kurdish-turkish to compare with it yet but at least we have some down here. Do ask if they have the rose petal liqueur. Mmmmmm.
I doooo miss living in London.... but only for the above. In an ideal world I could still visit and enjoy. Sue -- NTL ate my signature!
