Fried fish, roast dinners and curry, all in one day
How this city's signature food scores on the six taste axes the quiz uses. A match means the food here will feel familiar to you.
London eats in borrowed accents: fried fish, roast meat, spiced curry and puddings drowned in sauce. A taste test here runs from a battered fillet with chips to a plate of pie and mash, then a hot sponge pudding. Expect big portions, plain seasoning and a proper cup of tea in between.
A thick fillet is dipped in batter and fried until the shell puffs and crackles, with chunky chips alongside. Malt vinegar and salt go on at the table, and it is eaten from paper with a wooden fork.
What to judge: Batter crispness, fish flake, chip texture, vinegar
Where to find it: a chip shop counter
Eggs, bacon, sausages, beans, mushrooms, tomato and toast crowd a single plate, usually with black pudding and a pot of tea. It is a slow, savoury breakfast built to carry you through a grey morning.
What to judge: Sausage quality, egg yolk, bacon, bean sweetness
Where to find it: a café serving all-day breakfast
A joint of meat is roasted, rested and carved with potatoes crisped in fat and a jug of gravy. Crisp batter puddings and a sharp sauce complete a meal that runs long into the afternoon.
What to judge: Meat doneness, roast potato crunch, gravy, batter puddings
Where to find it: a pub dining room at the weekend
Marinated chicken is grilled, then folded into a creamy tomato sauce that is gently spiced rather than fierce. It is rich and slightly sweet, made for scooping up with rice or flatbread.
What to judge: Sauce richness, spice balance, chicken tenderness, smokiness
Where to find it: a curry house dining room
A shortcrust pie of minced beef is served with mashed potato and a ladle of green parsley sauce. Vinegar goes on at the table, and the whole plate is soft, warm and unfussy.
What to judge: Pastry, filling seasoning, mash texture, parsley sauce
Where to find it: a traditional pie shop counter
A dark sponge full of dates is drenched in warm toffee sauce and served with custard or cream. It should be moist enough to collapse under a spoon, sweet without turning cloying.
What to judge: Sponge moisture, toffee depth, sweetness, custard
Where to find it: a pub table after lunch
About $55–90 for six tastes
Morning for a fry-up, early afternoon for a roast, evening for curry
Eat the fry-up before ten in the morning, then walk it off before the roast arrives.
Start with the lighter dishes and move towards the rich ones, which is roughly the order these 6 foods are listed in. Serving sizes are the real constraint: ask for one portion between two people at the heavier stops, and you will still want the last one.
Budget for the day with the range below, and keep a little back for the stop you will inevitably add. Most of the money goes on the savory stops; the sweet finish costs the least.
Timing matters more than most people expect. The best window is listed below: kitchens run at their best before the crowd arrives, and the dishes that need a queue are worth it mainly when the queue is short.
Score each dish out of ten on flavor, texture, value and whether you would order it again. Write the note before the next plate lands, because after two more stops every dish starts to sound the same.
Rate every dish out of ten on four criteria and watch the ranking build itself.
Half a day for all 6 stops at a walking pace, or a full day if you sit down at each one and let the food settle.
No. Two or three stops a day for two days is easier on the appetite and gives you better notes.
The planner rebuilds the route around a vegetarian, vegan, halal or gluten-free diet, and the scorecard works for whatever you taste.
With the first dish on the list at the time of day given further up the page. From there the route runs light to heavy so the last stop still tastes like something.
Yes, and the dish list doubles as a shot order. A custom plan adds hooks, a shot list, a caption and hashtags for the city you name.
No. They are the widely documented signatures, which is what makes them comparable. The planner will build a route around street food or sweets instead if that is what you want.