If you are visiting London or if you live in London, you definitely have to visit Borough market! Even if you are not a big foodie, you will be impressed by the abundance of fresh food from the UK and Europe, as well as a variety of freshly cooked international street food. All of the traders on this market are normally from small farms and bakeries and they produce high-quality, authentic foods. This is probably the biggest food market in London although there are many others worth visiting.
Some of the foods are a bit pricey but in most cases they are worth trying. If you are on a holiday in London, you will be easily able to combine the visit to the market with some sightseeing as it’s right next to London bridge and The shard in Southwark. Even if you don’t buy anything, a walk across the market is highly recommended and you will probably get to try some delicious foods.
Here is how a day at the market looks like, we went on a Saturday so it was quite busy! Unfortunately all the pictures are taken with my phone as I didn’t have my camera with me but you should still be able to get a sense of the atmosphere of this place.
There are many dairy stalls with an amazing selection of cheese. I am a big fan of goats’ cheese and I was able to try quite a few there. I was struggling to choose but after I tried a couple I picked one extremely soft Swiss cheese from the Jumi Cheese traders that was absolutely divine. Their farm is in the Emmental region of Switzerland so as you would expect Emmental cheese was their specialty.
As well as cheese you will be able to find some amazing olive oil producers and try different types of fresh olives.
I never buy bread from the supermarket but I absolutely love freshly baked artisan breads. There were quite a few bread stalls with a variety of baked goods. You will be able to find lots of gluten-free options and breads made with different flours, not just wheat. The breads these bakers sell are nothing like the breads in the supermarkets, they are freshly baked with care. I bought a multi-grain bread and a thin olive bread from the Bread Ahead bakery (pictures further below). Look at this massive loaf of bread!
Of course you will also find lots of fresh fruits and vegetables as well, some of them from the UK and quite a few of them were organic produce, although I was expecting more stalls to be honest. I bought some of these delicious tomatoes but I don’t think they were local.
At Borough market you will also find lots of meat and seafood stalls. Parma ham is quite popular amongst the meat lovers as well as some other cold cuts from Spain and Italy.
I was also quite shocked to find a stall with some local meat from Nottinghamshire. I am guessing this only applied to the ostrich meat they were selling as the zebra, crocodile and kangaroo burgers are definitely not from the UK! I am only interested in seeing those rare animals alive and not eating them but this just shows that you can pretty much find anything in Borough market!
We finished the walk around the market with some seafood paella and London beer. There are lots of other street food stalls as well with Thai, Mexican, Middle-Eastern food and many others.
Finally, here is what I took home with me (although I wanted to buy much more!). The soft Swiss cheese spread on top of this crusty loaf of bread and some fresh tomatoes and olive oil was our simple but special dinner that night. Yum!
Here are a few other posts from fellow food bloggers you might also like:
Mini City Break: Borough Market, Maltby Street, Bermondsey & Bankside by Kavey Eats
Burrito Pabellon from The Greenwich Market Cookbook by Foodie Quine
More about London Street Food by Lovely Appetite
