Gizzi Erskine Opens New Food Hall and Market in Hackney

Mare Street Market — the Hackney food hall and creative market co-founded by Gizzi Erskine and Marc Francis-Baum — opens today, just ahead of the Easter long weekend.

In an Instagram post yesterday, Erskine described the project as intending to create “a delicious and creative space that celebrates all things Hackney” and, to that end, collaborators at launch time include in-house cafe and coffee roastery Flying Horse Coffee, much-loved Hackney florists Rebel Rebel, and Stranger Than Paradise records, as a well as a pop-up shop which will first feature the work of M.C. Overalls, a designer workwear label who has also designed uniforms for the market’s staff.

For the first week, food is 50% off, and limited to the market’s food stalls and deli (from 8am daily), and “open kitchen” (from 10am). The rest of the offering — including Erskine’s highly anticipated restaurant The Dining Room, and a seafood bar — will open gradually over the coming weeks.

Mare Street Market [Official Photo]

The menu for The Open Kitchen covers a wide range of casual options from a short brunch menu (smoked trout, scrambled eggs, or avocado, togarashi, toasted sourdough, among others) to pizzas (courgette flower, buffalo ricotta, lemon, chilli, tomato; parmesan cream, guanciale, black pepper), salads (artichoke hearts, slow cooked egg, vinaigrette or smoked bacon vinegar), and a selection of dishes simply labelled “fired,” including treacle-cured salmon, sprouting broccoli, radish and soba noodles, and rotisserie chicken, shoestring fries, watercress and chicken sauce.

Erkine’s Instagram story today also shows a range of tartine made with biga sourdough from nearby The Bread Station, topped with combinations like duck rillettes, cornichons, pickled onion and duck crackling, or smoked trout pate, smoked trout, Atlantic prawns, keta eggs, lemon and dill.