London - Guyanese Roti Truck

Brixton Market comes up trumps again.  While its international array of acclaimed cafes and restaurants get all the press, delicious food can be had in the streets surrounding the covered market, too. The Guyanese roti truck is green and parked up alongside a couple of other carts down Brixton Station Road. The lady inside - her regulars call her Aunty - is brusquely friendly, and makes everything she sells.

Out of the choices of curried goat, jerk chicken, chickpea curry or potato curry, I chose the potato curry roti, partially because it was £2.50 and partially because the man in front of me was ordering four of them.  He had good reason to be that keen.  The curry is heated up in the microwave (there isn't enough room for an oven in the van, although there is a stove top for making the rotis), before being wrapped up burrito-style in a fresh roti.  Chunks of potato are covered in a thick paste-sauce flavoured with your typical curry spicing (garam masala, ginger, cumin).  The roti is toothsome and, while tasting slightly of oil, is not oily or greasy.  The roti also easily holds the amount of curried potatoes, so there is no spillage as you are walking around, and the excess sauce is soaked into the bread at the bottom.  One potato roti kept me going for eight hours, a marvel for only £2.50.

When in Brixton and looking for very cheap and deliciously cheerful food, avoid the Guardian-acclaimed Kaosan or the chi-chi coffee shops in the arcade.  Head outside, along Pope's Road and Brixton Station Road, where Brixtonians get their fixes, for a better deal and no yummy-mummies and hipsters ruining your lunch.