Brunswick House Cafe is the treasure of Vauxhall

His grandmother Arabella Boxer has written some wonderful cookery books, his novelist father Charlie is a partner in the deli Italo, and his brother Frank created the eponymous pop-up Café and Campari Bar on the top of a car park in Peckham.

Having worked at Rochelle Canteen and Great Queen Street, Jackson has opened a rackety café and restaurant in the Vauxhall Cross headquarters of the architectural reclamation specialists Lassco, an elegant Georgian mansion stranded on a nightmare road junction. In what was originally the ballroom and later a music hall - the edge of the stage peeps out - you sit on and among clutter or, depending on your point of view, treasures. Most things are for sale.

Monday's lunch menu was brief. There had been a heavy weekend and deliveries don't arrive until Monday afternoons. The toaster blew up between Gorgonzola, red cabbage and radishes on toast and prosciutto and eggs designed to be on toast but resigned to bread. "Was there a big bang?" we asked the waitress. "No, she said, clearly disappointed. "It wasn't very exciting."

Braised lentils and chorizo were comforting and, later, lemon curd terrine was clever and delicious. The full menus are stuffed with irresistible ideas: Blythburgh breakfast slider, biscuit and provolone; rare roast topside, green sauce and dripping toast; Old Spot shoulder, nduja and fennel. You can see, as it were, where the kitchen is coming from.

A new better-equipped kitchen is being built and should be ready in June. Guest chefs pitch up from more formal restaurants for the thrill of writing their own menus and experiencing immediate rapport with customers. Bookings on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings are essential. Outside is a little suntrap where you can sit among statuary, sip keenly priced arcane cocktails and think that London actually never fails to intrigue and reward.

Brunswick House Cafe
30 Wandsworth Road, SW8 2LG