Last week I was in Whitechapel and I intended going for a curry at the New Tayyab on Fieldgate Street. I got given help across New road and ended up discussing local eating places. The guy helping me said I was near Cafe Za Za which served Mediterranean food at cheap prices. I was curious and this lead to a change of plan.
I sat down in this cafe and asked for help with the menu as I cannot see to read it. the girl who read the menu spoke poor English but I was able to get the idea of the food on offer. Meals seemed to be mainly pasta based with every flavour of chicken imaginable. as readers of my blog will know, I am amazed at the love affair this area's Bangladeshi population seems to have with chicken. but this place did pasta with Coronation chicken, pasta with Italian chicken, pasta with spicy chicken and pasta with chicken and pesto and many others besides. Hidden in this deluge of chicken were a few oddities such as pasta with fresh minted lamb, vegetable lasagne and pasta with tuner.
I was feeling disheartened and thinking of reverting to my original plan when the person reading the menu told me that Cottage pie was a special. Cottage pie is nice and comforting and is a dish I sometimes use to gage the quality of cafes so I went for it.
The potato was really nice and creamy. there was a bit of gravy but not too much. the mince was very finely minced, probably too finely minced. a small amount of curry spices had been used which gave the dish a nice taste, one that was enhanced with a liberal lashing of chilli sauce!
over all though there was not enough mince and the mince was too finely chopped so there was too much potato texture to make it a really good cottage pie. At £5.00 the price was reasonable without being exceptionally good value for money.
The coffee was disappointing. I think it was filter coffee but of rather low quality. it tasted a little bitter and it was certainly not strong enough. I also had a pain au chocolat which had been microwaved. there was far too much pastry and only a little chocolate. It tasted anything but home baked.
On the whole , staff were acceptably helpful without being outstanding.
My impression of this place is that it is run by Asians who want to dabble with Mediterranean food without having to really cook too much. there is far too much premade cheap food that does not taste as though it has been done fresh with care. It is not bad but I just came out of there feeling slightly underwhelmed by the mediocrity of Cafe Za Za. It is just too average and unremarkable and it certainly falls below the standards of many budget Italian coffee shops.
I give cafe Za Za 5 out of 10 as it does rather flatter to deceive and did not really live up to expectations.
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