I think this Independent Birmingham Festival was my favourite so far. It may have been the excellent company we kept, the stream of friends we bumped into continually throughout the day, or the fact that I was very tipsy by 1pm on the Saturday, but they really nailed it. Here is a super quick post on what we ate and drank at this celebration of the wonderful independents in this great city.
Buddha Belly. <
I’m mentioning this first because the sight of Momma Buddha Belly cooking with Sai melted this cold heart. A slightly different menu this time which we dived straight in to. The more familiar Southern Thai curry was ordered with salmon fish cakes and an outrageous beef noodle broth not dissimilar to a pho. Seriously classy Thai food. It’s impossible to not love Buddha Belly, even when I'm on strict instructions to not swear.
Baked in Brick.
Lee decided to spit roast an entire lamb for this event, which took me back almost twenty years to when we used to party together. We had a hybrid dish of the lamb meat with mac’n’cheese, salsa verde, crispy potatoes cooked in lamb fat, a Yorkshire pudding and gravy. The salsa verde was insane, as was the quality of the meat. Claire drank gravy from the Yorkshire pudding because that’s what Northeners do. Mental.
18/81.
Because we have very good taste. Claire’s was a profanity laden one that tasted of pumpkin spice, I had the off-menu Dead Rabbit Irish Coffee. I lie. I had three of them. Because we have very good taste.
Loki.
A delicious fizzy pink wine which tasted of tip-tops. Drank two bottles so must have been good.
Zindiya.
You may be aware that I live very close to these guys. I may have had a Deliveroo from them the night before. Still never stopped me eating a chicken tikka kati roll and samosa chaat. Huge amounts of flavour in everything they do.
El Borracho de Oro. </
They had a very attractive looking paella on the go, though it wasn’t ready so we changed tactics and went with patatas bravas and ham croquettes. It was a good choice. Both were crazy good.
Original Patty Men.
I have mad love for the burgers from these gents. The one I had with chorizo was as good as burgers get.
Waylands Yard.
Eggy crumpets. Halloumi. Chilli sauce. Call the fire brigade; this is absolute flames.
There were also custard tarts from Salcooks, plenty of gin at Jekyl and Hyde, and cakes from Bake. There were dogs, more dogs, live music, the best in local businesses, and more dogs. I think that someone complimented me on my coat, but I was pissed by then so they could have been calling me something far less polite. Most of all it was full of Brummies celebrating the best of Brum; sticking two fingers up to anyone who says otherwise. I had the best weekend there. I can’t wait for the next one.
In keeping with the Best of Brum, A2B got us there and back.
- 18/81,
- Asian,
- Baked in Brick,
- Birmingham,
- Buddha belly,
- Burger,
- Cocktails,
- Digbeth,
- El Borracho Del Oro,
- festival,
- ib,
- independent birmingham,
- Indian,
- Loki,
- OPM,
- Original Patty Men,
- salcooks,
- Spanish,
- Street Food,
- Thai,
- Uncategorized,
- waylands yard,
- wine,
- Zindiya,