Randomness Guide to London Menu

A small and unassuming-looking shop just off Portobello Road. Inside, it's full of all kinds of packaged spices, in bags or in tins, by 25g or by 50g. As well as individual spices they also sell their own blends, from barbecue spices to Moroccan tagine blends.

They also stock a few Japanese products - several kinds of miso, also nori, pickled ginger, etc - and a small range of Mexican grocery products (e.g. chipotle chillies in adobo sauce) as well as an extensive range of dried Mexican chillies. On most days, a table outside the shop offers a selection of fresh herbs, jalapeno or poblano chilli peppers and other exotic fresh vegetable produce (e.g. tomatillos or galangal root).

They sell empty versions of the smaller tins (the 25g ones) for 80p each (as of September 2008) - don't know if there's a bulk discount if you want lots. This is noteworthy as the tins are of square cross-section rather than round, and so much more space-efficient if you have a large spice collection.

On Kake's September 2008 visit the staff were friendly and helpful. Although I suspect there are cheaper places to get hold of some of the more common spices sold here, it has a pretty impressive range covering several culinary traditions, and so is rather convenient if you use a lot of different spices - and I'm looking forward to trying out some of the house blends.

They also offer online ordering from their website.

See also:

• New York Times review
• Qype comments
• Trustedplaces comments
• Tipped comments