Walking London, Part Two: Primrose Hill and the Long Way to Dinner

Saturday was Hammersmith and the pubs along its stretch of the Thames. Sunday was the long walk upriver to Barnes, a best roast lamb but with no Yorkshire pudding in it, and Camden until one in the morning — all of that is in Part One.

This is Monday. The shortest of the three days, and the one with the best view, the only rain, and the meal the whole weekend had been walking towards.

Monday: up the hill, then rain

We started late, for reasons connected to the Queen covers. The weather was better than forecast, so we went back to Camden for Primrose Hill.

The first place we went, since it was on the way to the market, was the pub we couldn’t skip: The Hawley Arms. This was Amy Winehouse’s local. She drank here, sang here, and by some accounts often jumped behind the bar to pour a pint. Ian didn’t find a decent beer there, but I got a few interesting photographs.

And of course, being in the area and not visiting Ian’s favourite brewery next door — 3 Locks — would have been silly. So we did: sat in the sunshine and enjoyed the wall art, the beer and the canal.

We had decided to have lunch at Camden Market, and went straight to the stall we had noticed the day before — Malaysian food. £12 for a small plate, £14 for a big one, £15 with a spring roll and a shrimp. We took the last of those; it was enough for the two of us and, for street food, very tasty. Unfortunately the stall has no tables or seats of its own, and everything around it was taken, so we ended up eating standing against a wall. We weren’t bothered exactly. Just not very comfortable.

The walk up to Primrose Hill from Camden is a genuinely strange transition. Ten minutes takes you out of the market crowds and into streets that feel like a village that has been quietly sitting there letting London happen around it — residential, quiet, expensive, self-contained. It is a perfect place to sit down and be calm.

And then the hill. It was busy at the top — people popping up like mushrooms, appearing over the crest one after another from every direction — and the view is worth every step of the climb. All of London laid out and named for you on the panorama. We stayed at the top for fifteen or twenty minutes, partly to take it in and partly because I needed to.

It is a view worth protecting, and I mean that literally: it is protected, with sightlines written into planning law to keep it. Standing there, you can see why somebody bothered.

Then a grey cloud built up on one side of the hill and we started down towards a brewery Ian had spotted near the BT Tower. The rain caught us almost immediately, and after three days of carrying an umbrella around London we finally opened it — for about two minutes, three separate times, whenever the rain tried to catch us. That is the entire return on the umbrella. I would carry it again.

The brewery turned out not to be a brewery. Toast Brewery isn’t based in London at all; what Ian had seen was a Change Please café that serves their beer. We had walked down a hill in the rain to a coffee shop, which is a very London outcome — and it was closed, despite saying it should be open. Yes. This wasn’t the plan. But I did a few photos again.

Dinner: the reason we walked

Every time we come to London we eat Uzbek or Armenian food, because London is the only city in the UK where you can.

Uzbek food is my home cuisine, and for years I knew exactly one place to get it — a small café called Uzbek Corner that I would have travelled a long way for. This trip I looked properly and found there are now something like ten Uzbek cafés and restaurants across London. Ten. I have no idea when that happened.

The way to the one we choose to go was busy and picturesque as usual in London, with the mix of very old, just old and new buildings on and around Regent street.

We went to Oshpaz, walking up from Great Portland Street to Regent Street to get there, because of course we walked. It’s halal, so there’s no alcohol, and after three days of pubs neither of us minded in the slightest.

We shared: carrot salad with spicy oil, beef manti (large dumplings, steamed or fried), lamb lagman soup (tender lamb with hand-pulled noodles), and two beef samosas. Two teapots, mango and ginger. Napoleon cake afterwards.

The manti and the samosas were the standouts, and both tasted properly authentic — which is the thing I am actually checking for, and cannot help checking for. We skipped the plov this time, and here is my reasoning, which I stand by: I make plov at home sometimes. Manti and samosa involve making pastry, which is real work, and that is exactly what I should be paying somebody else to do.

But for anyone else it is a must. Uzbek plov is not the same as Indian or Turkish pilaf. It isn’t just rice — it is a stand-alone dish with the meat already in it, and it needs nothing added except a fresh tomato salad for balance.

Then back to the hotel for the bags, and King’s Cross, and the train home. Full, footsore, and already planning.

Worth knowing before you go

Camden Market seating. Most street-food stalls have no tables of their own, and the shared seating fills up completely by lunchtime on a bank holiday. Eat early or expect to stand.

Oshpaz is halal and does not serve alcohol.

Addresses

Camden

The Hawley Arms — 2 Castlehaven Road, Camden, London NW1 8QU · thehawleyarms.co.uk · Sun–Thu 12–midnight, Fri–Sat 12–1am

3 Locks Brewing Co. — Arch S14/15, Water Lane, Camden Market Hawley Wharf, London NW1 8NX · 3locksbeer.com · daily 12–11.30pm

Central London

Oshpaz — 7 Regent Street, St James’s, London SW1Y 4LR · oshpaz.co.uk · daily 11am–10pm