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Brunswick House Café

30 Wandsworth Rd, Vauxhall Cross, SW8 2LG Full details & map

Café

Tricia de Courcy Ling

Time Out says 19 Users say 3/5 Rate it

By Guy Dimond Posted: Jan 13 2011

When I first visited London, I used to pass through Vauxhall Cross and marvel at the bleakness of the landscapes: the filthy train tracks and crowded trains, the traffic jams filled with impatient commuters, the urban decay. The big city can't get much uglier than this, I used to think; spare me from it.

Almost inevitably, Vauxhall's where I ended living when I first moved here, staying on a friend's floor in a squat. I got to know the area well over the ensuing years.

While I've moved on, Vauxhall has barely progressed over the past two decades. For all its green shoots of recovery - housing co-ops and associations, community gardens, a lively gay nightclub scene - it remains blighted by its position as a busy transport hub, with a murderous one-way traffic system that's hemmed in on one side by the river.

Yet among the six-lane traffic flows, security surveillance systems and idling diesel motors of Vauxhall Cross, one building stands out. Brunswick House, built in 1758 as a riverside mansion by the Duke of Brunswick, somehow escaped the Luftwaffe's bombs and the urban blight. It's a listed Georgian building, now occupied by architectural salvage company Lassco.

Ecape through the stone portico into a world of panelled rooms filled with salvaged fireplaces, chandeliers, radiators, flooring, and countless items of historic architectural detail from tiles to taps. It's like an eccentrically curated museum, except that everything's for sale.

The café's been running since May 2010, but it's gradually extended its opening hours, and now serves beer, wine and even cocktails in the evenings from Thursdays to Saturdays (Manhattan: £6).

The café's two rooms are decorated in the same style as the rest of Brunswick House: that is, filled with old curiosities you can admire and touch. 'God loves a rave!' states one sign made from reclaimed lettering, presumably reworded.

The café's run by Jackson Boxer - brother of Frank who runs Frank's car-park-rooftop café in Peckham, and son of Charlie, who owns a charming little Italian deli in nearby Bonnington Square called Italo. The menu's brief, seasonal, and well-sourced.

Weekday lunch options might include a simple parsnip-and-carrot soup, drizzled with olive oil; or a slice of goats' curd and spinach tart, served with a handful of rocket.

Kale-and-chickpea stew is ladled onto bruschetta, with some parmesan grated on top. Sandwiches include a doorstep of focaccia filled with air-dried ham and melted cheese, with some pickles and rocket on the side.

The cakes are bought in - Portuguese custard tarts and rice cakes, a nod to the area's strong Portuguese presence.

The variety of teas and coffees is good; in addition to flat whites and a few iced espresso-based drinks, there's a single-estate drip filter coffee and good leaf teas.

In the evening, the menu gets a little more ambitious; at weekends, it gets a lot more brunchy, and is a big hit with local residents.

Brunswick House Café's a modest, simple place in a spectacular, idiosyncratic setting, catering very well indeed for local workers and residents, even in the heart of the Vauxhall Cross gyratory system.

Tags: Café, Breakfast/brunch, South, Vauxhall

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