Restaurants

Amid the achingly cool environs of Brick Lane, this no-nonsense, 100%-organic pizzeria and café makes a welcome break from all the nu-rave neon. All distressed floorboards, bags of flour and wooden slabs (instead of plates), it offers a great, chilled-out lunch option. The menu currently focuses on pizza, which is a shame as the other dishes were good, but the range of fresh, innovative toppings is vast. Featuring ingredients from prawns to pumpkin, on paper-thin, crisp bases, these pizzas are brilliant, and about as far from the generic, grease-laden takeaway examples as you can get. Add the deli’s special ‘hot pepper sauce’ and you can see why Story attracts punters from all walks of life. On a busy Saturday lunchtime, most people chose a cool juice to accompany their food, but the café now has a licence and offers wine, as well as coffees and teas. There are ice-creams for afters – if you’ve room.

Time Out Eating & Drinking Guide 2008