Japanese & Venezuelan Street Food at Camden Market

By Aku Fu

On a rare visit to Camden market, and after a canal boat ride from little venice, we docked at this London tourist hot spot to find a funky Venezuelan hut which was serving some very intriguing looking food.

What was so appealing about Arepa was watching the cooking process of the freshly made cornbread and the wrapping of the beef filled bun. It all looked very good!

When asked, the happy, friendly owner – an older fellow who looked like he was working with his sons – informed us that the beef and chicken were halal, before kindly offering us a slither of shredded beef as a taster.

This, of course, tempted us into buying it.

As the cornbread was fried shallow, it was quite heavy; so it looked better than it tasted.

But while the shredded beef was flavoursome with good texture, it was also topped by a cooked banana (okay, so it was a plantain).

Overall it made for a filling meal, but not something that would make me overlook all the other foods available on my next visit.

We also found a chap dancing and singing and bopping along to something called Limp Bizkit, which I later learned upon asking is an American rap rock band!

He too offered us a customary sample, a sample that suckered us in and had us opting for a Chicken Katsu Curry Rice.

The meal had some nice sticky rice and creamy flavoursome and well proportioned chicken curry on top.

And though it did well to satisfy our hunger, again it wouldn’t have us ignoring all the other many stalls just to have another bopping Katsu.

It was worth a try, and I don’t regret it, but next time I will stick with the if-I-don’t-try-it I-won’t-know-it philosophy.