E Pellicci is an East End institution, famed for what it is, more than it’s food but to me that’s as good a reason as any to visit. I’ve walked past it countless times as it is just up the road from me, and more often than not (especially in the summer) there are people waiting outside to get in. At 3 pm on a January Saturday, we were able to be seated straight away, but only by sharing a table and because some brave souls were happy sitting outside.
They do a Full English or a veggie version and you can customise it as much as you like. The couple next to us had chips which looked fantastic but I chose to try out the homemade bubble instead. It was the wrong choice as it happened – not that the bubble and squeak was bad, it just couldn’t hold a candle to the homemade proper chips. I had beans, a fried egg that wasn’t too runny and a sausage of dubious quality. And it came with toast without us having to ask. It was all totally edible, if not thrilling.
Part of the appeal (besides the fact it has been around since 1901 in the same family) is the ‘charm’ provided by the guys running the joint. Everything you order comes with a side of bantz, as smooth as a comedy routine. When one guy ordered his Full English, without the bacon, the waitress chided him for taking out the best bit and that it would be rubbish without it. When the food was served, the waiter followed this up by calling out – ‘one rubbish full English’ and further admonished the hapless guest for going without bacon. I'm not sure how I managed to escape such judgement.
As the name would suggest, E Pellicci is of Italian descent and besides doing a fry up and pancakes, serves Italian food if you don’t want a breakfast-type dish. Plenty of Italians were packed into the place so I would make a cautious assumption that it’s pretty decent, although some of what we saw certainly wasn’t pretty.