The Brixton Love Affair: Rosie Lovell
Posted on 29. Apr, 2010 by Stephen in Brixton, Food
Tea and Cake with Rosie by Helena Lee
The love affair started almost six years ago when Rosie Lovell went looking for somewhere to set up a cafe. “I got the bus to East Dulwich and got straight back on again. Prams,” she says, eyes wide, “A lot of prams.” She flew over to Brixton instead and stumbled upon an empty unit in the market. “…and I was like – it’s amazing – I love it!”
She set up Rosie’s Deli Café when she was just 23 after studying for a degree in history of art, and from that point on, Lovell and Brixton have had a love-love relationship. She’s a clear hit with traders and customers alike – she cultivates regulars quicker than her home-grown lettuces. As soon as you step into her small Brixton deli you feel invited to the party -tinny music over chatter, cheery hellos, tea in mugs with the spoon left in, loaves of bread piled on leopard print covered shelves and best of all you know you’re a guest in her kitchen – you’re going to get damn good food which is “European with a bit of Moroccan…kind of French, Spanish Italian and English,” And you’re just as likely to find yourself sharing a table with her mates as the next hot sound from the neighbouring music studios. It’s the place to pop in for a cheeky taleggio and toms stuffed ciabatta, huge artichokey, fennelly salads, or to pick up a jar of Mrs Darlington’s orange curd or El Navarrico lentils in brine which look as though they’ve been hankered for in a market on her travels. She tantalisingly tweets the pictures of her asparagus tarts for lunch on Twitter. Warm cinnamon bun and a pot of tea all for three quid? If I were you, I’d go hungry.
When I meet Lovell, now 29, for tea and cake in her Camberwell flat, I realise the deli is an extension of her homely, artily cluttered kitchen, which is also slightly country (she grew up in Suffolk before moving to London). She’s had a frightfully busy week having shoots with Marie Claire, giving up alcohol for the week (“I drink all the time. I would happily only drink coffee and wine, and never drink water. It’s a hard task for me but it’s definitely working… I think.”), and serving coffee to Andrew Marr in the deli.
“He had four double espressos in two double flat whites!” she tells me as she sucks on a cigarette, “He’s lovely. So so nice.”
And that’s how she seems to describe everyone she likes– superlatively amazing or lovely. Lovell is ridiculously likeable. She laughs heartily. A lot. And she’s naughtily charming – not cloyingly so, diminutive, pretty in a free-from–excessive-artifice way and talks emphatically and with an honesty you can only warm to. Not content with running a deli which has queues for miles, she’s written a hit cookbook Spooning with Rosie – a chronicle of youth, scouting for boys, hangovers and love through recipes. Selfridges has chosen her to blog for them and she seems to maintain an enviable social life making coffee for singer Róisín Murphy and Alexa Chung, hanging out with her notable DJ boyfriend Raf and the likes of bands Basement Jaxx and Hot Chip.
Though she may look effortlessly successful, it was only through hard work and graft that earned her the respect of the traders around her as she built up the blank space from just one deli counter to now seating up to 25.
“You gradually prove your mettle…but that’s better. It’s a really inclusive community. It’s also a reserved community. It takes a while to be included – but it means more.”
She tells me that in the market community, everyone knows everyone, and were anything bad to happen she’d be looked after by the likes of friends Esme, owner of the organic store opposite, or Blacker from Blacker Dread Records a “very brilliant famous proper Brixton person”.
“I think a lot of that is to do with…what Brixton is famous for which is drugs and crime…but what you have is a real sense of identity in the place that you live and work.
“You wouldn’t open a shop there if you didn’t want to be around that. Otherwise you’d go and open in Fulham so it’s about the kind of people who are drawn to the area – it’s a good thing.”
Walking round the market, one thing that strikes me is just how middle class the browsers have become and the kind of stores in the market that have popped up as a result. When I mention this to Lovell, she acknowledges the change.
“I think inevitably that’s what happens when people read things in the Guardian and then they …make a pilgrimage. But what I think Brixton needs is people who invest more than that – not just to come to places that are talked about, but to go to the Chinese supermarket , the Iraqi supermarket, go and buy some vegetables that scare them. Embrace the fishmongers – whole mad fish, you know. That’s why I’m there. And that’s what’s fun. And, you always feel like you’re on holiday.
“Your motivations in Brixton have to be very genuine.” She tells me firmly, “That’s the only way to do it.”
Though Lovell is busy promoting and writing, and fast gaining widespread recognition she is at pains to explain that she still works hard to make her business work.
“I wash up as much as anyone else behind the counter. Because that’s the only way you’re going to get people to work hard for you; it’s the only way to get customers to believe you.”
Her book is reflective of her student life, peppered with stories about her best friend Doctor Helen, dates with boyfriend Raf (“The most cooked recipes from my book are all his. That’s gutting.”), photos of past holidays that could have been nicked from the kitchen pin-board. Accessible and verbally delicious, it’s slightly hedonistic and a bit like Nigel Slater on space cakes.
And it’s unmistakeably Brixton. The characters like Esme are brought to life through a recipe for Hot Wings – food from Jamaica and Colombia sing from the pages. The food in the book is totally international as it is inspired by “what it’s all about – people, circumstance and occasion”.
So what’s next for Rosie Lovell? Another book?
“Definitely! I’ve been doing lots of bread recipes..”
And will it reflect how you’ve changed over the years?
“I’m not 23 anymore. You know – i’m going to be 30 this year. It’s not going to be the impromptu – twenty people around your table getting drunk. There probably won’t be so many hangover foods.”
TV?
“I’d love to be on TV. But..dunno. It’s so hard to be on TV…I think it’s almost like a separate art and if you’re good at it then it’s a bonus. So yeah, who knows.”
Feeling honoured to be working with Selfridges, she is currently in meetings with the possibility of conjuring something in-store for them. I have the distinct impression Rosie Lovell’s business head is standing her in very good stead. A glittering TV career and a library of books may well be on the cards, but whatever happens, it’s clear that Lovell’s heart lies in Brixton and in the deli.
“It’s only a book,” she says of her achievement. “ It’s a lovely book and I love it. But as soon as you start believing sound bites or believing that you should have a car to pick you up then you’ve f***ed it, really..”
She smiles widely.
“The deli is always me and I am the deli.”
Rosie’s Deli Café, 14e Market Row, SW9 8LD, Open Mon-Sat 9.30-17.30
Spooning with Rosie, £18.99 is published
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