Leon's Moroccan Meatballs

It was the first time I had to take a connection flight alone, my first trans-Atlantic flight, the first international flight I paid entirely out of my own savings (not a work flight or a family trip) and I was in Heathrow's Terminal 2, with a long wait for my connection, scared, hungry and cold.

I had taken what at the time I viewed as a huge risk and gone to visit my then-girlfriend (now wife) to Edinburgh, as she was doing her master's there. I felt I needed to be very cautious, in order to ensure I wouldn't miss my connection to Turnhouse which was in another terminal and from another line. I was nervous that they wouldn't let me board the connecting flight because the name in my ticket wasn't identical to the name on my passport.

So I had decided that I would move from T2 to T5 and wait next to my gate the full five hours until it was time to board, because, you know, if I'm there earlier, there's no chance I miss my flight. The five-hour wait time had been a deliberate choice: I didn't know the airport, and couldn't predict how long it would take me to get from one terminal to the next. (Don't look at me like that; this is how anxious brains work).

But I was hungry and cold (did I mention that already?), so once I was at the gate I looked for food options near me. And that's how I came to Leon's.

The place is the authentic version of what Subway or those "fast food salad" places try to be and fail miserably at: Food that's honest, healthy and fast.

There, my disdain for quinoa and other superfoods made me forego many of the options and instead take the meatballs, a dish of lamb mince in a rich tomato and harissa sauce that reminded me, for all the world, of the spicy salsa my father made for huevos rancheros on family breakfasts every saturday morning. The dish was warm, sour, savory, spicy, flavorful and filling. It felt like entering home after the rain.

The dish packed a punch of flavor like a kick in the nuts and the sides - crushed peas with mint and lemon, which I had never had before, and a proper dal rice - were rich and filling without taking the protagonism away from the main.

Or at least, that's how I remember it - and why I always try to go to a Leon's to get it again every time .