Oh So Many Food & Drink Recs!
It's been a delicious month, here's the best of it.
Highly Enthused is a newsletter, once a podcast, concerning all the best things to consume in life. It’s written twice per month by Sophie McComas-Williams and Sophie Roberts, and today’s dispatch is written by SoMo! The majority of each newsletter is free, but there are five extra recs in each for paid subscribers. That’s often where the gold nuggets lie, and today they are all about FOOD. Thanks for being here!
Hi! How are you? I’ve been eating out an unseasonal amount lately - my birthday month! - so expect this newsletter to be a reflection of that revelry/gluttony. In fact, I’m dedicating the entire of today’s Fast Five to THINGS OR NEW PLACES TO EAT. Lucky you if you’re a clever/beautiful/treasured/precious paid subscriber. We appreciate you! Consider upgrading if you’re on the fence? It’s worth it. Onward to the freebies:
We used to live in Dulwich Hill before we moved to where we are now, in a small apartment block on the corner of Ewart St and Wardell Road, just down from the train station. Nearby is a collection of crusty shops; a newsagent, a pharmacy, a nothing-special cafe, a kebab joint and a rotisserie chicken shop we never wanted to eat at because the chicken spun on those spits so long that eating it was as dry and chewy an experience as chowing down on the corner of a beach towel. Anyway now we’ve moved away, of course a bunch of cool stuff has entered the chat. The chook shop is now home to Olympic Meats. Instead of rubber chickens, hunks of juicy lamb spin on the spikes, there’s a cabinet filled with crisp spanakopita, and for now it’s BYO (unheard of). It’s a very chill affair, with silver tables spilling out onto the pavement.
The name shouts *MEATS* but the mezze is incredible. Silky eggplant dip is topped with a rubble of walnuts; rounds of pickled octopus are smoky with a dusting of paprika; while mixed greens - tsigaridia - are sweated down until slackened, sweet and soft, snuggled up to big hunks of feta and fat black kalamatas. Pita all round, of course. You can order a gyro if you like, or souvlaki, but we went for the mixed grill and a plate of char-grilled fatty lamb chops, and poured beers from the next-door bottle shop down our gullets in the evening breeze. It’s perfect in every way, except perhaps the wait for a table - go early, it’s walk-in only, we waited for 45 mins on a Wednesday eve. Soon, the BYO license will give way to a drinks menu offering their own wine, a good reason to return.
In the Buffet office (the Buffice, to those in da clurb), we consistently drool over this non-alcoholic spritz brand out of LA, Ghia. They launched on Instagram during the pandemic, grew exponentially, fast, and are now valued at around USD$50m. Their office in LA is like a barbie dream house for food creatives (hi), and their visual identity and content direction is next-level gorgeous. Ghia’s founder, Melanie Masarin, who grew up in Lyon, is inspiring me lately across numerous fronts. Her Substack, Night Shade, is a top-tier follow (see link below). Her style is *chef’s kiss* - I’d expect no less - and she links the best of it in monthly wrap-ups, handy. I’m a sucker for when founders of massive companies write about how they run their day/deal with their insane workloads and chaotic inboxes. She describes her current approach in this post, which then prompted me to go watch her Ghia pitch on US Shark Tank, a show I’ve never ever watched before. It’s so brutal! Start-up culture in the US is so wild! Anyway, I think readers of this newsletter will like her style and take on business. Let me know!
It was my birthday last month and inspired Buffet’s very chic producer, Ella, who was wearing one of these on a shoot lately, I dropped by The Standard Store on Crown Street to get my very own… wait for it… “phone necklace”. The term makes me physically heave but honestly, I love it. It’s by a Berlin-based brand called Ina Seifart, ground zero for the big bead accessories trend - and they have such great colourways - the one I chose is baby blue with a neon green ribbon. She also makes bag charms, key rings, hair ties and all sorts of beaded ilk. It does feel like sort of a backward step in terms of how much I’m comfortable being attached to my phone, but we have a keyless door entry, I have Apple Wallet and so what the hell is the use of a bag anymore? Extremely handy for running around with the kids or ducking out for a walk or just strutting the streets like you’re nonchalant about your device addiction and just wanna be hands-free.
also told me they are “everywhere” in Japan right now so I’m going to take that as further Proof of Cool.
FIVE RECS DEDICATED TO THREE WORTH-IT PLACES TO EAT, THE EASY RECIPE I KEEP REPEATING FOR HEALTHY WORKDAY LUNCHES AND MY NEW PANTRY CONDIMENT ESSENTIAL. NOT SURE WHY I’M YELLING BUT FOCUSING THE FAST FIVE LIKE THIS FEELS LIKE A BIG DEAL! I hope you enjoy/are hungry.