MY FAVOURITE DISH:TARIK ABDELADIM'S BOULETTES DE SARDINES

The owner of York’s popular Algerian street-food restaurant, Los Moros, shares the family story behind his sardine fishcakes recipe

- TONY NAYLOR

‘I always say, “my falafel got me a restaurant”,’ laughs Tarik Abdeladim, owner of York’s Los Moros. In a way, it did. Launched in 2015, the Algerian chef’s original street-food kiosk had big fans in the owners of El Piano, a legendary York vegan restaurant. In fact, they liked Los Moros and its falafel so much that, when they decided to close after 21 years, the El Piano team invited Tarik to take over their Grape Lane premises.

Three years on, Los Moros, now a Michelin guide-listed restaurant, is forefront in a new wave of ambitious York indies. It is a fitting pinnacle to Tarik’s lifetime in hospitality. Now 51, he started out, aged 17, travelling from Algeria to work summers on the Côte d’Azur: ‘It was unusual. But my dad had lived in Paris and took us to France. We were accustomed to it.’

Leaving an Algeria then embroiled in civil war, Tarik came to Britain in 1997 and fell hard for York. ‘It’s a beautiful city and I was taken aback by how friendly northerners are. I found my second home,’ he says. Two decades later, York was likewise smitten with the North African food Tarik unveiled at Shambles Market. ‘The first thing I wanted there was merguez,’ he says, ‘I missed them so much and you want to represent your country. It’s a great street-food dish.