With London’s best street-food vendors moving in, Kings Cross is (finally) hotting up

There were early signs: the St Pancras champagne bar; the fun, dramatic Booking Office bar in the refurbed St Pancras Renaissance Hotel, with its Nick Strangeway-designed punch menu; the Guardian’s move to Kings Place, where you can have a cocktail in the ground-floor bar overlooking the canal.

Then, a few weeks ago, Central St Martin’s moved to Granary Square, a stone’s throw from the station, flooding the place with arty young things. And now, Eat.St has moved in to the area with its stable of high-concept street food stalls, making it official: Kings Cross is turning into a destination in its own right.

Currently in soft launch mode, the Eat.St “micromarket” kicked off last week with a rotating line-up of four food vendors every Thursday and Friday (and plans to expand this) on the brand-new, tree-lined Kings Boulevard, which links the station to Granary Square. Check the website to see the schedule.

All the usual suspects are there – Lucky Chip, Big Apple, Meat Wagon, Choc Star – along with others you might not have tried, like Stewed and Baked (one-dish cooking), Tongue ‘n Cheek (“interesting” meat cuts), Yum Bun (steamed buns) and Homeslice, purveyors of the best pizza we’ve had in the UK.

There are plenty of “up-and-coming” neighbourhoods that, in our opinion, never quite made it. But after a slow start, it looks like Kings Cross might be actually be a contender. Next time we go, it might not just be for the Eurostar.

Info
Eat.St, Kings Boulevard, N1 9AP
Thursdays & Fridays, 10am-4pm

The UJ round-up of the Royal Borough’s new foodie favourites

Call it a guilty pleasure; a bit of posh; seeing how the other half live. You can pretend you haven't been secretly sneaking your occasional Made In Chelsea fix – but however hard you try you may not be able to resist the new wave of surprisingly impressive foodie hangouts that are cropping up in this part of town for much longer.

Flashy, trashy, too-much cashy? Sometimes. But a little bit of louche can go a long way. Here’s our round-up of the Royal Borough’s foodie finest…

LISTEN – to David Rodigan, Zinc and more at Red Bull’s Revolutions in Sound. Oct 13. Fabric, 77a Charterhouse St, EC1M 6HJ

SHOP – floral, native and geometric print trainers at Nike x Liberty. Great Marlborough Street, W1B 5AH

DRINK – £4 cocktails and much more at London Cocktail Week. Oct 10-16. Various locations

EAT – at The Minotaur, The Old Vic Tunnel’s answer to underground, Michelin-starred dining. Oct 10-25. The Old Vic Tunnel, Station Approach Road, EC2A 3AY