London for Insiders: Shopping for special ingredients in London

Nov 19, 2010

Shopping for special ingredients in London

Attention foodies, this is invaluable information. If you live in London, you've probably come across Borough Market, which I've blogged about extensively in the past. You will find most fresh goodies you will need there.

Game season at Borough market

But when it comes to dry goods, surprisingly, London can be a tad tricky, so I'm going to share a couple of the places I go to when I'm scavenging for special ingredients.

First and foremost. The Harrods Food Halls. Not only are they beautiful, art nouveau, historical, and really fun to visit (if you can ignore the hoards of tourists, of course), but they are massive, with halls and halls filled with the most exotic ingredients, all the cheese, charcuterie, breads you can imagine. They also have several little restaurants and traiteurs, if you really just want to stare and eat, without necessarily having to cook.

Harrods also do a spectacular "own brand" line of wines and bubblies. Really well priced, great quality wines. You can buy by the case and have it delivered to your door, I strongly recommend their Chablis, amazing value. They've just opened a beautiful new wine shop in the LG, well worth a visit.

Image courtesy of www.harrods.com

Whole Foods is also a pretty good option, particularly the larger stores, like the Kensington one.

Another surpisingly good place to try is the Harvey Nicks food hall. It's rather tiny, but really well stocked. I was recently on a mission to find semola di grano duro to make some pasta at home, and this was actually the only place I could find it.

Finally, Fortnum and Mason. You will find the usual array of jams, pickles, cheeses, and teas, but also, in the LG floor, a minimart with all sorts of goodies as well.

Infos