A labour of love

Anyone opening a restaurant in these dodgy times deserves admiration, but to open an Arabic restaurant way off the beaten track deserves a round of applause.

Café Arabica is the baby of a couple of chaps, Jad and James, who started off in Borough Market with their 'legendary' organic falafel. Here, they're giving full rein to home-made, mostly organic dishes: a lengthy selection of mezze with a few special main courses.

After our experience, I'd advise sticking to the mezze. That's not to say that our main courses - meaty, fresh swordfish spiced with sumac served with baby spinach and a fabulously spikey preserved lemon and dill salsa; and a velvety Yorkshire Longhorn rump steak marinated in juniper berries, orange zest and honey - weren't good, it's just that the little dishes were excellent.

Yes, the falafel was almost 'legendary': ultra-fresh, crisp and melting. Mohammara, usually a paste, was deconstructed into its components: peeled, roasted red peppers, chillies, sultanas and toasted walnuts.

Baby squid was chargrilled into savoury tenderness with honey and green chilli; salad was a perfect assembly of tomatoes, mint, spices and air-dried Arabian cheese. Mezze are around the £4 mark, mains about £13.

Café Arabica's drapes, squashy sofas, brass hookahs and frondy plants do little to disguise the fact that it's been done on a shoestring. But that's all to its credit: it really makes you feel you're getting the benefit of a labour of love.

Café Arabica
4 Conlan Street, W10 5AR