La Montaña Alfredo’s Café | Handmade, Natural & Organic Scented Candle Inspired by Spain | Luxury Candle Gift for Women | Coffee, Brandy, Black Tobacco & Leather

Product Information

Once it was safe to come home to Islington Nina went to school at St John’s the Evangelist in Duncan Terrace. “I loved it,” she says. “I wanted to go to the school my brothers were at, Brompton Oratory, but mother said it was too far for a girl. What could I do? It’s not like now. You had to do what your parents said.” The result was secondary at St Aloysius near Euston. And then on to work at the café full time. Reader’s Choice Scranton Times Winner 2023 – Best Square Pizza
Reader’s Choice Scranton Times Winner 2023 – Best Kid Friendly Restaurant

Closed and boarded up for two years, Alfredo's caff (a north London institution since the 1920s), looked like a gonner. Then it was bought by the Sausage & Mash micro chain and after a meticulous restoration was born again - complete with Alfredo-style cafe decor (steel-trimmed blue laminate tables, bent-wood chairs, original Vitrolite signs, white china mugs, glass-globe lamps), and classic British comfort food. It's posher and pricier than the average greasy spoon but it has the classic hallmarks (ketchup, mushy peas, crumble and custard), plus proper mash, gourmet sausages, and pinot grigio.If you’d like to feature on this blog, or make a suggestion about anyone who grew up, lives or works in Islington please let me know, via [email protected]. Thank you.

The customers: Camden Passage trendies and the occasional celeb (actor, Toby Stephens and Little Britain's David Walliams among others).My favourite customers were the builders – as long as you gave them a big plate they were happy,” she says. Nina still remembers where comedian and singer Harry Secombe sat when he tipped her after a fried breakfast. “The Kray brothers used to go there too,” Nina adds more warily. “When you read the terrible things they did it’s a surprise. They were charming – you wouldn’t think butter would melt.”