Totterdown Canteen, Wells Road: 'What Emma Chamberlain had in mind when she heralded 2025 as the Year of Normcore'
Where else can you get an oat flat white for £1?
Something interesting has been coming over me in the past few years. I don’t know whether to blame it on the Y2K vibe resurgence, lingering pandemic upheaval, a yearning for the simpler things, or my approaching thirtydom.
I have visions of suburbia. Quiet main roads flanked by trees, homework, a childhood friend’s dusty backyard complete with guinea pigs and plastic playhouse, apple squash in Ikea cups, stretchy summers that can bake or drizzle, and cycling in Primark Uggs with a flip phone in my pocket.
Somewhere in there is a distinct memory of a long journey to church camp in a tent-filled rental van and a greasy spoon pitstop for sustenance. I don’t think it was my first, but for some reason it’s the first I remember. What sticks in the mind, other than my southern confusion at the offer of a hot tea with a hot meal, is a homeliness – like sitting at someone’s kitchen table while also in a restaurant – alongside a proliferation of beechwood panelling as I satiated my teenage appetite with a full plate of fried things alongside my dad and brother. It was comfortable and easy.
However, to this day I still can’t stand a white breakfast tea. Pass me the peppermint.
That feeling of no-frills familiarity and a good feed was what I was in search of when I made plans one midweek morning to visit Bristol’s greasy spoon with a view: Totterdown Canteen. It’s known for community–mindedness, good value English breakfasts, monthly steak nights, and a proclivity for cheerily replying to all of its online reviews.
In true greasy spoon style, the menu is extensive and breakfast is an all-day affair. Under ‘main breakfasts’ you’ll find the standard full English in three sizes, with V, VG, GF, and kids all catered for. The rest of the menu lists, under ‘other breakfasts’, various eggs Benedicts, a multitude of things on toast, porridge, 13 different bap fillings (highlights include fish finger), and 15 optional extras.
Eggs Benedict (£8.50) and large breakfast (£9) with oat flat white for £1 it is.
To the sound of Imagine Dragons covering Taylor Swift, commuters stop by for caffeine (own cup earns a discount) and locals bump into each other while breaking their fasts. With the city-centre-destined traffic drifting past outside, ‘TC’ is a true neighbourhood fixture.
By drenching the walls in lime green emulsion, Aaron Wardle and team have certainly given the place an original character. Coupled with overhead fluorescent lighting it isn’t exactly the desired environment for the migraine-prone who decide to run up hills before breakfast (me). I’m also not one to quash creative expression, so in that vein I say go forth Aaron. No one will forget this caff in a hurry.
The food is exactly what we wanted, which is mostly loads of it. It’s also tasty in a simple, straightforward way – poached egg yolks are runny, black pudding is earthy, English muffins are soft, and use of hollandaise is liberal. Bacon and sausages are on the dry side but hash browns are crisp, fatty, and optimally fluffy inside.
The flat white is standard ’spoon stuff, though is supplied by local roaster Wogan, and not burnt, which isn’t what you’d necessarily expect from a fry up. I am ‘into’ coffee (V60, brewing ratio, blah blah) like a lot of Bristol, but for every coffee snob there’s someone bamboozled by coconut milk cortados when all they wanted was a cup of joe. It’s a both/and, and Totterdown Canteen is doing bits.
There’s a lot of bemoaning the demise of the greasy spoon at the moment, but I’m not sure it’s vanishing from Bristol just yet, not at 141 Wells Road anyway. Small plates and filter coffees are great for the people who like them, but the Canteen is a refreshing change from highfalutin pop-ups and comes across as very secure in itself, its customer base, and its offering.
I’m sure Totterdown Canteen was what Emma Chamberlain had in mind when she heralded 2025 as the Year of Normcore.
All words and photos by Caitlin Johnson-Bowring
Totterdown Canteen, 141 Wells Road, BS4 2BU
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Love this, love Caitlin, love Emma