Made In Brixton: Halloumi Room

Friends and Brixton wrappers Stu, Emma, Jess and James set up Halloumi Room in 2015, selling healthy, affordable veggie wraps at festivals and street parties.

How did Halloumi Room come about?
We had seen what was on offer and thought we could do better. We wanted to give people an alternative to the predictable meat options. So our ethos is vegetarian, with halloumi the star ingredient. We bought a gazebo and gear to do street parties and found we were mobbed.

How do you do the halloumi?
We source the halloumi from a Cypriot wholesaler, who gets us the best stuff. It pairs brilliantly with our main fillings: our own recipe Mexican refried beans and slaw. The wraps are then filled with avocado, tomato and herbs.

You had a busy South London summer?
We have now grown to be able to trade at full-scale festivals and took our stall to the ON music festival at Blackheath last month. We also had an amazing time at Lambeth Country Show in July and have done some great street festivals. We hope to be at either Brockwell or Blackheath fireworks.

What have been the main challenges?
All sorts of things! Speeding up our service to keep the queues down and finding people to work flat out without getting flustered were just two. Overall, the toughest thing has been to balance our work lives – we all have full-time jobs.

How do you promote yourselves?
Word of mouth, Twitter and Facebook. When writer Michael Rosen tweeted about our wraps it was a real coup.

halloumiroom.com | @halloumiroom