Ombra

Ombra is that person in your friendship group who looks great with curtain bangs and owns a set of terracotta-coloured linen napkins—really cool, but not trying too hard. Empty wine bottles find a new life as vases for dried flowers and candles flicker on tables. It’s where we want to be every Friday night. Bottles of wine with cool labels are ferried to tables of four who are photographing, puncturing, and eating puffy gnocco fritto, and spritzes are delivered to couples dissecting a fried artichoke layer by layer. You can almost hear them muttering, “one for me, one for you.” Which is true of all the Italian food at the Hackney spot. Expect your repressed hoarder tendencies to surface as you guard, sorry share, the excellent food. Especially with the tiramisu. We would cross oceans during a storm for it—and by that we mean, walk across a bridge over the Thames when it’s mizzling.