Costcutter

I’ve been living in the area for well over a year, and I’ve never bothered to explore the little shops by Manor House station. I never bothered going into Costcutter because I figured it might be cheap but wouldn’t have the variety and quality of groceries I’d want. Today, after going in for the first time, I am totally won over by the endless plethora of random imports, in addition to all your staples excepting fresh meat. Loads of pickles, Polish sausage, jars and boxes of exciting unidentifiable foods, loads of different kinds of cheeses, frozen seafood, organic milks, coffees, juices, an impressive alcohol section with different and interesting things, spices, fresh fruits and veg, cereals, biscuits, crackers, pastas, pestos… I could go on and on, but I will basically sum it up with everything you could possibly want for your daily grocery-​shopping needs minus fresh meat and fish. I intend to do all my shopping here in the future, and shall only venture into the nearby Tesco or Sainsburys if I need meat. I’m kicking myself for not discovering this place earlier, but better late than never I suppose.

Bloody friendly staff is all I can say. There’s the Costcutter Supermarket (which has everything), Costcutter Off Licence (which has all the booze, cigarettes and the little stuff) and there’s the New Yorker which is their little café. The Café staff are friendly, good food and drink. 6 for £5 on their beers and has the biggest polish section I’ve seen in North London.

Wouldn’t bother going in here during the daytime, what with cheapr supermarkets galore just down Green Lanes, but they have got a decent offie area at the side, which has served me well on many a trip home after a hard day’s slog…
Also worth checking out is the little café called the ‘New Yorker’ which seems to be part of the same operation: decent coffee is hard to track down in this area, but the cappuccino here passes muster and the staff are always friendly. One interesting little «factoid» about this place: it’s housed in the actual (rebuilt) ‘Manor House’ pub after which Manor House station and the surrounding area got its name. As a local who’s positively gasping for a pint in the area, I do wish they’d kept it as one!

There’s little to rave about here, it’s a corner shop after all. It’s plonked halfway along Brownswood Road, attached to a lugubrious estate and I always forget it’s there despite walking past it most mornings on my way to work. We’ve been in a few times to buy a bottle of plonk on our way home from an early Sunday night meal in one of the Blackstock Road restaurants but their selection is far from inspiring, as is the whole place. The lighting is dismal and does little to help in the decision making process. It’s always a matter of grabbing the least poisonous looking bottle and heading out. The creepy crowd of greasy staff make the experience all the more uncomfortable and for some reason I always feel as though they’ve short changed me. They do have an impressive wall of magazines but I doubt there’s much that appeals to the more discerning reader. And the shop’s bins sitting right outside the entrance help only to make you think this really is the armpit of Finsbury Park. I did have a moment of excitement at finding a ancient tin of Peese Pudding though. But that’s as good as it gets.