Empanada Shop Near Me in Mayfair: Chango's Tiny Counter on Avery Row

Chango's Mayfair shop is a narrow counter at 27 Avery Row, W1K 4AY, on the pedestrian lane that runs between Brook Street and Grosvenor Street, about four minutes from Bond Street station. It opens at 11am every day, closes at 9pm Monday to Saturday and 6pm on Sunday, and has room for roughly four people to sit. If you need an empanada shop near me between Oxford Street shopping and a Mayfair meeting, this is the quick-lunch option most people walk straight past.

Chango's own story is short and specific. The company says it began when founder Bernardo Neville, who was born and raised in Tucumán in northern Argentina, decided to bring the empanada he grew up with to British customers. Tucumán is the province that holds Argentina's national empanada festival, and its empanadas are known for being small, juicy and hand-crimped, which is the style Chango leans toward.

From that start the business has grown into one of London's larger empanada operations. Its website lists nine shops, from Richmond, Wimbledon and Highgate to Parsons Green, Wandsworth Town, Clapham Common, Kensington Arcade, the Royal Exchange in the City and this Mayfair counter. It also sells to restaurants and delis across London and runs a catering line that pairs boxes of empanadas with Argentine red wine for office parties.

The core range on the company's online shop covers Traditional Beef, Spicy Chicken, Four Cheese, Ham and Cheese, Tomato with Mozzarella and Basil, Spinach and Ricotta, Pumpkin with Goat Cheese, a vegan Humita made with sweetcorn, and an unusual Olives and Mozzarella with sparkling wine. Google reviewers at Avery Row single out the chicken most often, with one calling it the best thing on the menu, and several mention the tomato, mozzarella and basil as the lightest choice.

The shop has a further surprise for visitors who know only the Buenos Aires repertoire: reviewers also mention fatayer, the triangular Lebanese pastries that became part of northern Argentine cooking through Syrian and Lebanese immigration. A four cheese pizza appears in reviews too, so the counter works for a group where not everyone wants pastry.

Chango publishes its take-home prices rather than its counter prices. On its website a half dozen of any single filling costs £18.50, sold pre-cooked and frozen with a three-month shelf life, and delivery is free on orders over £60. A pot of Argentine chimichurri is £4.90, six chocolate alfajores are £12.50, six maicena cornflour alfajores are £10.50, and a Chango Tasting Deal bundle is £67.

Be realistic about the space. One reviewer noted that only four people can sit at a time, and another described it simply as a very small place. Treat this as a takeaway with a ledge, not a lunch spot for a group of colleagues. The lane itself is quiet and mostly pedestrian, so on a dry day the easiest plan is to eat standing outside and keep moving toward Brook Street or Hanover Square.

Chango holds 4.6 stars from more than 130 Google reviews for this branch, but the recent ones are mixed. One visitor this summer found the empanadas a little dry and said most of the fillings on offer that day were spicy; another called the service indifferent. If you do not like heat, skip the spicy beef and spicy chicken and ask what is fresh from the oven; the four cheese and the spinach with ricotta are the mild choices, and pumpkin with goat cheese is the vegetarian one reviewers either love or find odd.

The take-home boxes are the part of Chango that most other London empanada counters do not offer at this scale. Every box on the website is pre-cooked and frozen, keeps for three months from the production date, and goes straight from the freezer into a hot oven at home. Delivery is handled by Chango's own drivers and is limited to London for now: orders of £60 or more travel free, and smaller orders carry an £11.80 delivery charge.

That makes the arithmetic simple. Three boxes of six plus a pot of chimichurri comes to £60.40, just over the free-delivery line. If you only want a couple of boxes, collecting them from Avery Row on the way home saves the delivery fee entirely, so ask at the counter which fillings are in the shop freezer that day.

Reviewers who return tend to use the shop exactly this way, tasting two or three hot empanadas on a first visit and coming back for the fillings they liked. One visitor who tried the tomato, mozzarella and basil, the four cheese and the spinach and ricotta in one sitting wrote that all three tasted fresh and that they would come back for a quick bite.

Walk to the Brook Street end of the lane and you are steps from Handel and Hendrix House at 25 Brook Street, where George Frideric Handel lived and composed from 1723 and Jimi Hendrix later rented a flat next door. Claridge's sits a short walk west on Brook Street, and Hanover Square with St George's Church, where Handel worshipped, is two minutes east.

Sunday's 6pm close is the one that catches people out. If you arrive late or a filling has run out, the Kensington Arcade branch on Kensington High Street and the Royal Exchange shop at Bank keep the same range, and the online shop delivers frozen boxes across London. For a sit-down Argentine meal with wine instead, ask Karpo in the Karpo APP for a parrilla near Bond Street.

Address: Chango Empanadas, 27 Avery Row, London W1K 4AY. Hours on Google Maps: Monday to Saturday 11am to 9pm, Sunday 11am to 6pm. Nearest station: Bond Street on the Central, Jubilee and Elizabeth lines. Seating: about four seats, so plan to take your order away.