Holla! Today I had the pleasure of eating at Roadkill, a stall in Camden’s Stable Market which only opened two weeks ago. This is one for the more meaty of the foodies amongst us – I don’t think there is one vegetarian thing on the menu… ok maybe the slaw is, but that’s probably about it.
Roadkill are a brand new ethical and sustainable food stall; they don’t use any single use plastic and they are a self contained butcher and therefore use as much of their cow (this stall is beef only at the moment) as possible to ensure very low wastage. Even once the meat has been fully removed, the bones are roasted to help make their sauces! The butchery part of the process begins at 6am on site and the butcher table is hidden away in a cupboard when the stand is needing to be functional as a kitchen.
The gang here pride themselves in using the ‘Best of British’, supporting local companies and hand picking everything they use in order to keep quality high. I imagine that with the mysteries of Brexit looming in our near future it will definitely help with already having ingredients sourced in England, at least import-fee-wise.
Showing up, I found it quite confusing to get there…an address of ‘Camden Stables Market’ (the place is a maze and there are a lot of food stands there) made the search a bit vast, but for when you visit it’s in the North Yard, just past the Amy Winehouse statue, heading north. We did wander aimlessly for ages.. also from their Insta you may think there’s a sit in more restaurant style option but there isn’t, it’s a stall but we did get to perch at the counter on the two stools they had available – thanks guys! There are also more picnic bench type seats available if you can nab a pew.
We tried the bacon cheeseburger, the rib-eye steak and the loaded BBQ beef dripping fries…
Loaded BBQ Beef Dripping Fries
As they say ‘on the tin’ (there is no tin, but you know what I mean), these were indeed beef dripping fries covered with a generous heap of 5 hour pulled slow roasted beef and some kind of magical light creamy cheese sauce with a drizzle of BBQ on the top. Lush! I really liked these… they tasted kind of sweet maybe due to the BBQ sauce and the meat is mega soft… sometimes I feel like topped fries don’t have enough topping but this wasn’t the case here. The chips are from a frozen bag rather than being handcut or any of that malarkey, but the way they are cooked makes them special. The cherry on top for me with this dish was probably the cheese sauce… it had a great consistency and was so creamy, it went brilliantly with the beef – perfect.
35 day aged rib-eye steak
The menu for this one doesn’t say how big the steak is, but it was a pretty normal steak size (maybe 7 or 8 oz) which was flame grilled and dished up to us pre-sliced. We weren’t asked how we wanted the steak cooked so I presume it comes the same for everyone, and it looked maybe medium to me. For someone who loves a rare steak I initially thought ‘hmm’ and stroked my chin (in my head) but actually the meat was really well seasoned and the fat had a melty texture rather than tough. The little charcoaly bits from the flame grilling added a different level to the flavour too. Very nice.
Bacon Cheeseburger
This one was a single patty of aged Dexter beef .. again there are no weights on the menu but this seemed like a to me – a standard burger size. Before biting into it, it looked moist (mmmm moist) with little bits of treacle cured bacon poking out from the edges and the cheese sauce luring us in. While we’re there, the sauce is amazing, subtle but a lovely cheese hint…the subtlecheese (geddit?) and consistency of the cheese was perfect… kind of like a slightly whipped butter. The meat was a bit pink so around the medium mark and very nicely cooked. You can really tell the quality of the beef Roadkill use. The buns used are brioche and cream, sourced from a local bakery, and the slightly pickled onions inside added a lush sweetness. It wasn’t overloaded with salad so that was greatly appreciated; often lettuce or tomato can make a burger slippery and collapse but this one was on fleek, as they say.
We also had a couple of fizzy drinks, the menu says they offer ‘childhood favourites’ so I just went for a Schweppes lemonade, though it would be nice to have some flat options available.
My dish of the day and one I kept pointing to when punters were queuing up,and bogging at our grub, were the loaded fries. They were so so nice, moist and each bite had different layers of flavour from the chips through the beef and then the cheese sauce. They’re also one for people who aren’t that keen on cheese because the flavour is so subtle but it just adds this joyous level of creaminess onto the beef and…..gahd. Well it’s all just very nice. The fact that we were sitting outside today at a lovely temperature of 1c and forgot about the cold while we were eating shows how distractingly good the taste was.
Roadkill are due to spread out over London with a few more stalls plus they also offer Butchery Masterclasses where you learn how to butcher specific pieces of meat, then get to eat everything you butchered as part of a three course meal. That sounds like a bit of me. I’ll definitely be seeing Roadkill soon and I recommend you pay them a visit if you’re a meat fan.
Forked by Stefpuff
Instagram: @camdentownroadkill
fork my piehole 