Dining Out 049: Café Mondo

Dinner in Camberwell.

There are many good things about the newly minted Café Mondo on Peckham Road (it’s next to Toad Bakery so during the day on a Saturday it looks like Hinge has been sick on the pavement out there), but the main one is as follows: I think it is important that a place exists where, if you say the words “Camberwell Handshake” nicely to a server, you will be handed a tallboy and a shot of tequila for the price of only £6.

This bargain kind of sums Café Mondo up, at least in its evening wear. During the day, of course, these lads are purveyors of big, doorstop-ass fish finger sarnies and Muffulettas that you could fucking knock someone out with – you have read the rave reviews and seen the Reels I’m sure – but by night it is a dive-but-make-it-kinda-fancy type deal.

There is counter seating, a menu that blends high and low (there’s pangratatto, yea, but there’s also a patty melt slapped on the plancha like the finest Bacon Egg and Cheese), and lurid blue light in the bathroom, where, on a board opposite the sink, is pinned a sign which reads YOUR FANNY IS FINE. All of this combines to create an atmosphere that is distinctly a laugh, and distinctly its own thing, which is always refreshing. And this is before we even get to the fact that they ripped one of the toilets out to make room for their Museum of Stones.

I showed up late last Friday night – it was the last stop in a tour of bars I was doing for something I’m writing at the moment – and we were immediately greeted with a round of tequila and verditas while we waited for our table. This is basically a tequila shot (are you sensing a pattern) chased by another shot of what is essentially very herby green juice, which neutralises the burn of the tequila. I’ve drunk one of these once before at Daisy in Margate, and have longed for another ever since, so now having it on my doorstep is very good (or bad) news.

Next came a rag-tag round of drinks. One was a lurid yellow-green concoction that looked like pure neon in the glass, with a bright red cherry bobbing on its surface (a Cherry Hiball), another took the form of a mini negroni (on the menu as a Spanish Negroni), and finally there was a teeny tiny martini with a bit of MSG for good measure, in keeping with London’s big current love of smol bean cocktails. All were great – they didn’t scrimp on the booze not in an obnoxious way where the alcoholic taste overtakes everything else – and stood us in very good stead for the food.

It’s generally a sharing format in the evenings, and we were lucky enough to try a lot of the menu. As you’d expect from a place that makes its bread from uh, bread (sozzzz), the house focaccia is brilliant – oily as you’d hope, and springy like a Premier Inn mattress – as are the finocchiona and spicy giardinera pickles, which, crucially, are crinkle cut, which I think is THE way to cut pickles (not to be a pervert but the vinegar gets in the creases and it’s sewww good).

Elsewhere, we were served up an indulgent honey and Taleggio toast – a tried and tested combo, of course, but one that Really Works, as sweetness undercuts tanginess – and a crispy chicken thigh with green sauce is fatty (complimentary) but fresh. As an [Lady Gaga voice] Italian girl, I had such a big soft spot for the house meatballs and red sauce that I actually kind of magpied them away from the group to keep for myself, in all their chunky, marinara-lavished glory, though the night’s real revelation was fennel grenobloise. This was soft and pliant on the plate, gooey with brown butter and parsley, and offset with this wildly good, crunchy crumb. I couldn’t stop eating it even when I wanted to, which is always the sign of something good.

In general, the combination of posh (fussy little bites of toast with confit tomatoes on, say) and crap (brown sauce on the latke) at Café Mondo is something that speaks to my personal likes and dislikes very well. And while I do suspect that a sandwiches-and-beers scenario might be more What The People Want in the evenings in general, I really respect the ambition that has gone into *not* doing that, and I think it’s cool and worth commenting on when any cook flexes their muscles and puts their own tastes front and centre, asking the rest of us to enjoy it with them.

Here, you’ll enjoy food that is made with rigour but also with a sense of humour – kinda like if a French-trained chef made you a Rustler burger – and you’ll also find strong, clever drinks, and a comfy seat at the counter where you can watch the smashed beef and cheese for those patty melts frying so seductively that you’ll basically be forced to order one. Café Mondo is fun and inventive and not really like anywhere else I’ve been. I’m glad that the Camberwell/Peckham political border has it.

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Dining Out is written by Lauren O’Neill and illustrated by Lucy Letherland. Weekly reviews are free to read every Thursday, and you can follow us on Instagram here, but if you’d like to see more, you can subscribe for £5 a month or £50 a year, to get extra content every second Sunday.

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