This week’s visit on the plan that James and I have to eat at every food stall at Norwich Market was Deb’s, which we visited when we did this market tour in 2023.
The hot food options. We were welcomed promptly by a friendly team member who took the order and checked if we were eating at the stall or taking away. I went for a sausage & bacon large bap which was £5.50, an increase of £1.10 since we last visited which is in keeping with the general price inflation of the market. I also asked for the bacon to be crispy and the team member was happy to accept that request, as I sometimes think that some people find my bacon demands as a little sub-optimal.
Wise advice, although the bloody things circulate freely around the market now.
My bacon and sausage cooking away. James went for a double cheese burger, encouraged by myself to be fair as he was intending to have a single one, and that’s starting to cook on there as well. It was agreed by myself that I wouldn’t wait for his food to arrive before I started mine, as I wanted to ensure I started my meal at the temperature that the stall intended.
It’s all a bit cluttered, but I like an authentic feel to a cafe rather than polished steel all over the place. Craft beer bars I like to be on-trend and shiny though of course, I don’t compromise on my standards there. I make this point as this felt like a traditional market stall, the kind of set-up that one might hope to find for a traditional lunch-time snack.
The sauce is sweet chilli that I’ve put on. And as a food review, this is as good a bacon and sausage roll as I could desire from a market stall. But let’s take this opportunity to talk bacon, shall we? This wasn’t the anaemic, apologetic stuff you sometimes encounter. This was bacon as it’s meant to be, each rasher a crispy, bronzed warrior having bravely faced the heat and emerged victorious, with absolutely no sign of that dreaded, flabby surrender. I reject the out-dated concept that the fat is somehow the tasty bit, it isn’t, the meat is the tasty bit. I want crunch to this arrangement and that’s what I received. The portion size of the bacon was generous, perhaps overpowering the sausage slightly, but the food all tasted fresh and of a decent quality. I was left surprised and delighted by this roll, it felt like value for money to me.
James and his artistic photos. I have to move out of the way of these as he doesn’t want me cluttering them up. He mentioned afterwards that he saw two frozen burgers being cooked and that he wasn’t expecting a gourmet experience. But, he thought they were excellent in terms of their depth of flavour, so that’s another win. He also said:
“When asked, I must recount a recent gastronomic encounter with a seemingly unassuming double cheeseburger, procured from a purveyor of street-side sustenance – a quintessential market stall, if you will. The bovine patties themselves presented a quite remarkable profundity of flavour, a veritable symphony of umami notes that danced upon the palate with unexpected sophistication. Encasing this delight was a bun of demonstrable freshness, its delicate crumb yielding with pleasing softness. The accompanying verdant assemblage, colloquially termed ‘salad’, provided a most welcome textural counterpoint, its crispness juxtaposing splendidly with the tender succulence of the meat and the molten embrace of the fromage. Furthermore, the entire construction was served at a most agreeable temperature, ensuring optimal sensory engagement. Indeed, this offering transcended its humble origins, representing a paradigm of market stall culinary artistry, a truly delightful and surprisingly nuanced gustatory experience.”
I was very pleased with this food, the service was friendly, the surroundings were clean and it’s a welcoming stall. I liked that there was quite an array of different sauces and condiments, all which the customer could access themselves so they could have as much as they wanted. The bacon was cooked perfectly, I felt that the pricing was reasonable and this is one of my favourite market stalls so far this year. I also noticed that there seemed to be a higher proportion of regulars than at other stalls, so they’d soon recognise me and my bacon requirements if I went on a regular basis.
