The Breakfast Club, Soho

Every time I go to post recently it seems that I'm looking for a reason why I haven't posted in ages. This time I have an actual reason, Mr Hef and I just brought our first house! We moved just over 3 weeks ago and have only had the internet for 1 and I've spent most of my internet time so far watching videos of puppies on Youtube. I've always been told that moving house is stressful, but to be honest it wasn't that bad. Buying the house on the other hand was on a whole other level, we put the offer in over 6 months ago and literally had one thing go wrong after the other. As I mentioned in my last post, we went to London to see The Book of Mormon in January and it was a much needed break from house stress. And one of the best parts of the trip? I ate myself stupid, like literally felt sick. One of the best parts of the eating/Book of Mormoning adventure, was going to The Breakfast Club. I love a good breakfast as much as the next person (actually probably more) and the menu for The Breakfast Club looks insanely good, so I was very much looking forward to it.

I decided what I wanted from the menu before we even got to London, because there was SO MANY amazing vegetarian options and I basically wanted to eat them all. Breakfast is without a doubt my favorite meal and I think a good breakfast should contain the following things (in order of importance) 1. Avocado (I could eat them all day every day, but there's something special about having them for breakfast) 2. Chili (who doesn't love a bit of spice in the morning) and 3. This isn't really a thing, but it should be massive, you haven't eaten for at least 8 hours! I wake up every morning feeling like I haven't eaten in about 3 years, so it has to be big! So that's why I chose the Huevos Al Benny (minus the chorizo) with poached eggs, roast peppers, avocado, fresh chillies, spicy hollandaise on toasted English Muffin. It's basically the perfect breakfast and I can confirm that it also tastes incredible. The whole Breakfast Club experience was great, our waiter was super nice, it was busy (we queued, but only for about 10 minutes) but comfy and both Mr Hef and I left with full bellies and smiles on our faces! I should also mention that I found the tiniest bit of bacon on my plate, it's not the first time its happened and i'm sure it wont be the last. I've been super upset about it in the past, but after all we're humans and we make human errors, so I decided, as I hadn't actually eaten it and could hide it on Mr Hefs plate to ignore it. I didn't even want to mention it to the waiter, but Mr Hef did anyway and he wrote off the rest of our bill. Overall, I thought it was amazing! I'm already planning what to have on my next visit.

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Terre a Terre, Brighton

Happy New Year! It seems that I managed to avoid posting anything for the whole of December, usually me not posting is due to laziness. But the lack of posting in December is due to working a million hours a week and living off of food solely produced by Pret. It's not the best existence and I'm looking forward to reintroducing vegetables and fruit (other than the fruit in mince pies) in to my diet. I'm currently still in the dietary land between Christmas and the rest of the year where it's still totally acceptable to live off of chocolate for a day and treat yourself to decadent meals. So as a post Christmas treat, myself and my friend Hannah G went to Brighton to try the Terre a Terre tapas. I've been to Terre a Terre once before with Mr Hef and I can easily say that it was one of the best meals I've ever had. My meat eating brother has been many more times and claims it's his favourite restaurant!

We got to Brighton and suffered through some freezing torrential rain, a hail storm and winds so strong they nearly blew me off of the street, but it was totally worth it for this. I wish I could remember what everything on this plate was, but when the lady was explaining all I could think about was shoving it in my mouth and it was so good when I did, that I have since forgotten. Everything tasted delicious though and despite there being a lot of different things on the plate the flavours went really well together. The Tapas comes with chunky chips and wine for £39.25, but Hannah and I went for non alcholic cocktails instead (she had a Lychee Blush, lychee and apple juice shaken with ice, topped up with lemonade and drizzled with pomegranate juice and I had can't remember the name of mine, but it contained spiced fruit punch, ginger beer and fresh berries. They were both amazing). I am still in love with Terre a Terre and Brighton in general, so I hope to be off there again soon for more vegetarian delights.

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Acorn @ Demuths

In May this year I won a competition with Demuths and Meat Free Monday for a meal for 2 in Demuths restaurant and a day at the vegetarian cookery school. I was absolutely over the moon as I'd been to Demuths before and loved it and have always, always wanted to go to the cookery school! So Mr Hef and I booked a super cute B&B just outside of Bath (It was called Fern Cottage and run by the nicest couple I have ever met in my life!) and enjoyed a weekend of relaxation and amazing food! Since I won the competition the restaurant has been taken over by it's head chef Richard Buckley and is now called Acorns, but the amazing food and wonderful atmosphere is exactly the same as I remember it and if I didn't live over 100 miles away I would visit this restaurant as much as physically possible! 

Going to a vegetarian meal with Mr Hef is always a joy because he doesn't know which vegetable is which (really!) which keeps me laughing for the whole meal! He also never really knows what to pick, so I usually get to choose for him and (selfishly) pick things that I want so that I can eat them too. So for his starter he had carrot and cashew pate with spelt toast, seasonal leaves and herbs, ginger gastrique and tamari cashews.

I had truffled broccoli with cauliflower pannacotta, pickled Kohl Rabi and a thyme dressing. I definitely preferred my starter, but both of them were absolutely delicious! The cauliflower pannacotta was particularly yummy, with a caramelised top and a soft creamy base it went perfectly with the truffled broccoli.

For the main meal I went for the stuffed courgette flower with smoked Dorset red and ricotta, cannellini beans and chard, in a romesco sauce. I've always wanted to try a stuffed courgette flower, and it definitely didn't disappoint. It was full of flavour, and the courgette flower was litterally oozing with smoked Dorset red and ricotta goodness. So much so that Mr Hef got a bit jealous and wished he'd ordered it.

I also really liked the look of his white onion tatin with heritage carrots, runner beans and greens, rosary goat's cheese mousse and curried emulsion, so we swapped halfway through (which makes me seriously happy, I never get to do that in restaurants!) The tatin was also extremely yummy, half an onion in a delicious pastry case, what's not to like!

By this point I was feeling pretty full, but not too full to miss desert. There's always room for desert, especially if it's chocolate ganache with salted caramel, candied pistachios, raspberries and what can only be described as a chunk of chocolate on the side. I pretty much want to eat anything that has salted carmel involved, so this was the obvious choice. It was as rich and delicious as it looks, the perfect end to the incredible meal and enough to make me need a little lie down afterwards.

Mr Hef went for the vanilla pannacotta with plum gazpacho, seared plums and shortbread, which was equally delicious. Mr Hef particularly liked the short bread on the side, I can also confirm that it was amazing.

The restaurant it's self is so cute and comfortable, it literally looks like someone's front room. If you're ever in the area, I highly recommend giving it a try! 

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France

Did I ever write about my holiday last year? If I did, I can't find it. Well it started terribly. I moaned and moaned at Mr Hef until he finally said yes to going to France and pretty much booked a little gite to stay in at random, just because I had a good feeling about it. It was the first time Mr Hef had ever driven on the other side of the road and after about an hour, he accidently slipped on to the wrong side of the road and nearly crashed in to a car. Now that is bad enough as it is, but then the lady we nearly crashed in to proceeded to turn her car around and chase us. We were absolutely terrified and decided that the best course of action was to try and loose her by driving down tiny streets. Of course, this crazy French lady was not even a tiny bit put off by that and after about 10 minutes she overtook us, slammed on her breaks and started screaming at us. So after that little drama, we got back on the road and were nearly there, but I couldn't get through to the guy who was supposed to give us the keys. We thought we might not even have a place to stay and started to panic. After sort of finding the place, but still not getting through we went to the shops and started to think of a back up plan. Then, luckily we finally got through (we had the wrong number) and proceeded back to the gite. Only we managed to get totally lost. Luckily the man who was giving us the keys came and found us and we finally got there. And when we did, we seriously could not believe our eyes. It was absolutely beautiful, comfortable and we had a whole pool all to ourselves, the holiday was quite simply perfect. So perfect we booked to go back again this year.  This year was just as amazing as the last and with all of my adventures, it contained some lovely food as well. 

I really enjoy self catering, because I love cooking and when you're on holiday you can take as much time as possible. We ate in most days, but on the days we did go out we went all out. On the third day of our holiday we went to Aubeterre, which is dubbed the prettiest village in France. As as soon as you walk the paths there you can see why. We went to a restaurant called Creperie de la Source and had galettes, which are sort of a crepe meets a pizza. I had one filled with 4 types of cheeses and tomato, it was so delcious and the view from our table on the balcony (pictuted below) was incredible.

We also ate in a beautiful town called Brantome, it's surrounded a large river which you can canoe around (Mr Hef made me last year, we got stuck on a weir, we decided to give it a miss this year).

Once again the views from the resturant are incredible, I can't remember what it's called, but it's right on the river so you can relax and soak up the sights. Both times we've been away, Mr Hef has eaten a lot of vegetarian food (or so he thinks, he sometimes forgets that ham in sandwiches, or peperoni on pizza counts as meat) and then he seems to get an overbearing craving for steak. So he had a steak and chips and I had a warm goats cheese on toast salad.

We were both super-satisfied with our meals and went to a patisserie in the town to buy some tarts. But after a whole week of blue skies and 30 degree heat, the skies opened and I was left running to the car, protecting my box of tarts like it was my only child. Luckily they remained (mostly) intact and tasted amazing.

Since the gite has been refurbished and now has a beautiful new BBQ, we decided to take advantage and cook up a storm one night. I made some yummy garlic butter corn on the cobs, baked sweet potatoes and potato salad for mine and Mr Hef had burgers. This is what self catering is made for!

As we ate in most nights we let ourselves have one really fancy meal out at a restaurant called Le Citronnier. We ate there last year as well and even though we arrived really late, they were really accommodating and had a separate vegetarian menu. To start with I had a whole baked camembert, because when you're in France that is totally acceptable.

There was only one option for the main, which the manager apologised for profusely, but I didn't mind at all because to be honest, that's more option than in some restaurants in France! The main option was a kind of mushroom omlette made with local mushrooms that had some fancy names. If you have read this blog before you will know that I HATE mushrooms, but this was actually really nice. Beautifully presented and it wasn't really affected by my hatred of those brown slimey things.

Next there was cheese, there's not much to say about cheese, but it looked pretty so I added the picture in anyway.

Then there was pudding, delicious, decadent profiterole pudding. It was stunning. We also had some fancy local wine, I don't normally drink, so the one glass I had lead to me falling in the pool when we got home.

The holiday was incredible, I didn't want to go home and I definitely want to go back. If you fancy going you can find the gite here. 

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St Petroc's Bistro, Padstow

No one else in my family is vegetarian, my Mum once was, but after a few months I came home to find her eating a steak and she hasn't looked back since. So when we go out for a meal, it's usually not very vegetable centric. Despite this I will ALWAYS find something to eat, I'm not a fussy vegetarian and to be honest, if it's food and it's reasonably yummy I am happy.

We've been to Cornwall a few times with Daddy Hef and he's always mentioned going to Rick Steins restaurant and now that my older brother and I are actual grown up people with real jobs (my little brother is still a lazy bum) I thought it would be nice to finally take him there. First of all I looked at the Seafood restaurant, which does look lovely, but the vegetarian options make me a little sad and I would probably have had to sell my soul, my car and possibly my body to pay the prices in there. So after a little research I settled on St Petroc's Bistro (I only had to sell my soul for this one, I need my car for getting around and my body for filling with food). There is a few vegetarian options for the starters, I went for asparagus with hollandaise, because if you didn't already know I am obsessed with asparagus. The asparagus was cooked perfectly and as this was the first time I have eaten hollandaise that has not come from a jar, it was a proper delight for my taste buds. I could have eaten at least 4 (maybe even 5) plates of it.

So then it was on to the mains. There was only one option which was the oven dried tomato, thyme and cornish blue cheese tart. You could choose sides, but as I knew I wanted to eat a desert I just had the tart with a salad on the side. It was really beautifully cooked, with just the right amount of blue cheese. You never want too much blue cheese in a meal, you need a good mold to other ingredients ratio.

For desert I went for the lemon tart, which is one of my favourite deserts and I have to say that this is the best one I have ever tried. It had a wonderfully tart centre, which was caramelised on top (yum) and incased in a delicious crumbly pastry case. It was the perfect end to the meal. So if you're in the area definitely check it out, don't be put off by the fact that there is only one vegetarian main, because what ever it is, I'm sure it will be amazing. And if you are a meat eater, my family all seemed pretty happy with their meaty dishes.

P.s I'm sorry for the lack of proper images, they seem to get worse as the pictures go on, I think this is due to it getting darker and darker and me being too lazy to get my proper camera out of my bag.

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Baked Camembert, Walnut and Mushroom Fricassee at Nelson Street Resturant

As you may or may not know, I detest mushrooms, but there are some exceptions such as when vegan Emma cooks them (she has a magical mushroom touch) and the other day when I went to take some pictures at the restaurant that my brother works at. While taking the pictures I got to try the baked camembert, walnut and mushroom fricassee. Well, I think the picture says it all, who wouldn't want to eat that! So I just thought I'd share this beautiful cheesy picture for your viewing pleasure! Enjoy.

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Confessions of a Chocoholic Afternoon Tea, London Hilton, Park Lane

I'm not sure if I really believe in soul mates, but if I did Georgie would be mine (sorry Mr Hef). We are both boys under our super girly exterior (thats a bit of a lie, I look like a boy from the outside too), have oddly similar boyfriends and share a love of all things food and cake. I met Georgie when I started working at a chocolate shop in Southampton. She didn't like me because she thought I was trying to take her job, little did she know I was a massive slacker who was just there to constantly annoy her. Any way, this year for my Birthday Georgie got me the most awesome present, a chocolate lovers afternoon tea at the Park Lane Hilton Hotel in London. The afternoon tea started with with a super friendly man explaining all of the options on the menu. Georgie and I were happy to eat whatever they gave us (as long as mine was veggie!) and we started things off with a glass of champagne.



They then brought us an assortment of teas to look at/smell, which excited us both greatly. I went for an afternoon tea blend, I can't remember what Georgie had, because I'm useless. After we had our champagne and tea, it all started to get very exciting, we were presented with the most beautiful finger sandwiches I have ever seen. They were absolutely delicious and quite dainty, which luckily left enough room for the large amount of cake we would soon be eating.



After the sandwiches we were presented with a beautiful 3 tiered tower of scones, pastries and miniature fancies. I didn't manage to take a good picture of how beautiful it was, because, quite frankly I was too excited about eating it all (sorry). After getting over the excitement of the beautiful cakes, we went straight in with the warm chocolate chip, plain and fruit scones. Once again they were absolutely delicious and perfectly accompanied with jam, cream and the best chocolate praline I have ever tried. All the the cakes and scones are handmade at the Hilton and you can really tell, they we're light, fluffy and extremely fresh.

Then we got to the cakes. I don't even know what to say about them. Each one was unique and had an amazing flavour. I think my favourite was the raspberry and elderflower cupcake, mainly because anything containing elderflower is a winner in my books.

After we had devoured the first cake layer (which consisted of a battenberg, Sasher torte, raspberry and elder flower cupcake and a red velvet cupcake). We were ready to tackle the second (which consisted of white chocolate and cherry cheesecake and red velvet and orange tuile, Milk chocolate cremeux, pistachio macaroon with manjari chocolate filling, iced shortbread butterfly with an orange and chocolate profiterole, lemon and raspberry marshmallow cone and a meringue lolly). This layer was made even more exciting by the fact that the plate was made of chocolate. Yes! YOU COULD EAT THE FREAKING PLATE. We noticed that some of the other guests that were enjoying the afternoon tea were taking their left over cakes away in super cute little boxes, but Georgie and I aren't ones to be defeated by food. No! We ate the whole thing, well, we didn't quite manage to eat the whole chocolate plate, but Georgie took a bite. She's a real champion. 

Obviously I would recommend this to any one, it was the perfect way to spend an afternoon in London.  Everything was to such a high standard and tasted like heaven! If you're not convinced, here's a picture with Georgie and the chocolate plate. A CHOCOLATE PLATE!

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Nelson Street Restaurant, Buckingham

Have I ever mentioned that I have 2 brothers? Well I do, an older one and a younger one, if you don't already feel sorry for me then you should. I went through years of double brother bullying, but we're all grown up now and are pretty much the Brady bunch (probably a lie). Weirdly we all like to cook, my little brothers (lets call him bearded Hef) specialties are very non vegetarian pulled pork and mega sandwiches (think man vs food) and my older brother (lets call him moustached Hef) has worked in restaurants since he was about 16. This year he started working in Nelson Street restaurant and I've had the privilege of eating there twice. I'm not going to do a proper review because it may be slightly biased, but the food really is spectacular as is the decor, the service and the atmosphere of the restaurant. So I'll leave you with some pictures of what I've eaten there, which I'm sure will be enough to make you want to go!

Blue cheese, walnut and poached pear salad

Glamorgan sausages, creamed spinach and beetroot.

Nut roast with dauphinoise potatoes and red cabbage.  

Salt and caramel chocolate tart.

White chocolate fudge, salted caramels and chocolate truffles. 

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Saf, Kensington

It was vegan Emma's Birthday a few weeks ago, which is always great because it means I get to go and play with Vegan Emma for a while and it almost always involves good vegan food (like most of our play dates). This year we met up after my training day in London, then went to Saf in Kensington. Emma had a voucher so we could only choose a few things on the menu, but I found it hard to chose out of 3 items, so would have definitely struggled with the full menu. The restaurant is based in Kensington above a Wholefoods (I could spend days in this shop), we rushed there after both being stuck on the same train in different carriages! 

I chose the starter before I went otherwise we would have been there all day! Emma already knew which one I was going to go for, but really, how could I resist raw vegan cheese. The dish sounded amazing, Pesto au Poivre: basil pesto between layers of cashew cheese with a pink peppercorn crust, served with rocket salad, dehydrated raw flax seed crackers and drizzled with a balsamic glaze. It was one of those dishes that tasted as good as it sounded, lovely crunchy flax crackers, with salty cheese and a thick layer of pesto. This was definitely the best cheese substitute I've ever tried and to be honest I would rather eat it over dairy. 

Emma had Dolmades: vine leaves filled with cauliflower rice, pine nuts, cumin, lemon juice and dill served with a vegan yoghurt and cucumber dip. I'm a bit afraid of vine leaves, but tried one anyway for the sake of my blog (and because I couldn't resist). I can confirm that they were also delicious. 

For the main I went for the Asparagus Farinata: slow-roasted asparagus tips in a chickpea farinata crêpe served with lemon- tarragon aioli and house salad. I feel a bit sad with myself for choosing this one because although it was really yummy, Emma and I made something similar not too long ago and I feel like I should have ventured out and had the raw pad thai. This can only be a good thing though, as it means that I will have to go back to try it :)

I loved trying the raw dish at Saf and I'd definitely recommend it for a filling, nutritious meal, you can check out the website here. I had a lovely vegan Emma's birthday (I hope she did too) and we finished the evening off by visiting the roof top film club in Hoxton and watching the Big Lebowski :) 

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Gallery Cafe, Bethnal Green

I've eaten here 3 times now (I thought it was way more times, then realised that I had just ordered more than one meal on each occasion) and each time I never get around to blogging about it, probably because the food is so good and the portion sizes are so big, each visit puts me in to some kind of food induced coma. This time vegan Emma and I decided to be a bit more refined and only order one thing each. As I said I've tried a few things off of the menu, the halloumi wrap, a calzone with vegetables and jalapenos and of course the nachos (if you didn't already know, I love nachos).

This time I wanted to try something different, but as soon as I saw the menu I couldn't resist the nachos. Luckily vegan Emma is a genius and suggested we get two different things and share, so I went for the vegan nachos and emma went for the facon burger.  Both were incredible, the nachos are the best I've tried, covered in vegan sour cream, refried beans, fresh salsa and jalapenoes (there's also the option to have them with vegan cheese). And the burger, oh the burger, since discovering a new love for facon I was well up for trying it on top of a veggie burger. It didn't disappoint, I'm not even sure what the burger was made of, but it was vegan and super tasty!

I full on love this cafe, if it was closer I'd be in there all the time. The staff are always lovely and the chef even gave me a free flapjack because they'd run out of vegan cheese! So if you're in the area, give it a try!

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Cherry Trees Coffee House, Padstow

To be honest, I just wanted to show you all a bit of veggie food porn here. Mr Hef and I were in Newquay last week for Boardmasters and although we didn't actually go to the festival, we sunbathed on the beach, played in the sea, watched skating competitions, drank some cornish cider and best of all... ate loads of Cornish food. We were only there for 3 days, but I managed to fit all of the essentials in! Mr Hef and I are quite a lazy couple, he takes ages to wake up and then once he does we take even longer to get out of bed. We only usually have Sundays off together and we never make it up past 12 then he ALWAYS wants a full English breakfast. This is a massive problem in Milton Keynes because there is no where that does one (and I'm often feeling too lazy to make one!). After staying up quite late to watch the meteor shower (mainly him, I kept falling asleep) the same thing happened in Newquay, despite it being 1 in the afternoon, Mr Hef still wanted breakfast, I did protest (as I usually do) and tell him it's lunch time, but once his mind is set thats it!








I was a bit bored of Newquay by the 3rd day, I love the beaches and the atmosphere for Boardmasters, but I know there are much nicer places is Cornwall. So Mr Hef and I popped in to Padstow to soak up the last of the sun before the long drive home. After looking around (unsucessfully) for some breakfast for a while we stumbled across Cherry Trees Coffee House. There was a table right in the front, facing the beautiful harbour which was enough to make us go in. I was also drawn in by the giant, delicious cakes in the front (although I was so full I didn't order one). After scouring the menu and realising they did an all day breakfast (Mr Hef was ridiculously happy) I battled with the decision of a veggie breakfast or Cornish cider and cheddar welsh rarebit with apple chutney. Obviously I ended up going for the rarebit and I'm glad I did. It was seriously good, in fact it was the nicest meal I ate whilst there. It was one of those things that you crave immediately after you've just eaten it. There were loads of veggie options on the menu at Cherry Trees Coffee House, so it's the perfect place to stop if you're soaking up the sights in Padstow.

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Cameron's Brasserie, Stony Stratford

I've definitely mentioned before that I live in the good old city... town? Of Milton Keynes and there's not much veggie stuff going on here. So when I got an e-mail from Cameron's Brasserie saying that they we're holding a 4 course vegetarian evening during National Vegetarian Week, I couldn't wait to book a table. I've eaten at The Navigation Inn, Dan Cameron's first venture, countless times and always enjoyed the variety of vegetarian options. And recently tried Cameron's Brasserie for the first time, so I was more than excited that there would be a whole menu dedicated to vegetarian food. The restaurant is situated in Odells yard in Stony Stratford and fits in perfectly with the charming market town. It was extremely hot when we went, but the huge doors were open making it light and airy in the restaurant. Once again I forced Mr Hef to eat vegetables with me, I don't think he was too enthused, but still enjoyed it (more than he let on, I'm sure!).

Boccancini Mozzarella, Air Cured Heirloom Tomato and Basil Salad

The vegetarian evening consisted of a 4 course set menu and I booked with out even looking because I was sold by the fact that there would only be meat free food! The first course was that cute little cauldron thing above filled with Boccancini Mozzarella, Air Cured Heirloom Tomato and Basil Salad. It was a nice light way to start the meal and I seriously wanted to steal the pot, I'm not sure what I would have done with it, but I want one.

Asparagus in Filo Pastry, Wilted Wild Garlic, Pink Grapefruit Hollandaise

The second dish was asparagus in filo pastry, wilted wild garlic and pink grapefruit hollandaise which was funking delicious. I love asparagus, so any kind of asparagus on my plate makes me happy. This made me extra happy though because it was wrapped in perfectly crunchy filo pastry and covered in tasty hollandaise sauce. 

Mushroom and Goats Cheese Wellington, Parmentier Potatoes, Crushed Peas and Mascapone and Chantenay Carrots 

The main meal had a mushroom in it, I knew there would be one snuck in there somewhere so I had already prepared myself. But to my surprise I loved it and actually ate the whole thing, it was cooked to a good texture (no nasty slimeyness) and went perfectly with the onions and goats. Topped off with pastry it made a really delicious main. All of the other vegetables on the plate worked really well together and lets be honest, it looks pretty fantastic too!

Balsamic Marinated Strawberries, Vanilla Shortbread with Basil and Cassis Sorbet

The desert was the most interesting dish, mainly because it had basil sorbet! I'm not going to lie, it was pretty weird, but it did go well with the balsamic strawberries and overall it was really delicious, very tart and full of flavour. Mr Hef didn't like it so much but still managed to eat his vanilla shortbread.

It was £23.95 for the set menu, which I think is great value for the quality and variety of the food. I really hope they put the night on again, as it was so nice to go out somewhere in Milton Keynes and have a whole vegetarian meal in a really wonderful restaurant. 

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De Waaghals, Amsterdam

Sometimes it's hard finding good vegetarian food when you're away, the last time we went to Amsterdam I'm pretty sure we just ate pizza for the whole weekend (not that I'm complaining, I could eat pizza forever). So even though we decided to book this trip a few days before we actually went, I did some research to try and find good veggie restaurant to try. The only one that stuck out to me was De Waaghals, it had positive reviews on trip advisor and the menu sounded great. So I tried to book online, which wasn't very successful, but we just turned up in the end and explained that we'd tried to book. The guy was really apologetic and said they'd booked us on the wrong day and offered us a table anyway.

Now this review may be slightly biased as we'd just come from the Heineken experience (it's veggie, don't you know) and I was feeling pretty merry. Now if you've been to the Heineken experience and are thinking that it's a bit ridiculous that I was feeling it after two tiny beers, you are correct. But I'm a massive lightweight; I was once sick after drinking only one cider the night before (although it may have also had something to do with the fact I'd been jumping on my bed before work). Any way, I was in a very good mood when we got there and when the food (and more alcohol) arrived the good feelings continued. The restaurant was fairly busy, but there was a few tables left at 7pm. It had a really chilled out environment which made it nice and comfortable. There was also a rather large cat sleeping in the corner, who only got up to be fussed by diners and then let out to play with some other cats, this increased my meal enjoyability by about 150%.

My Classic Dish 

From what I gather from the website and other reviews the menu changes every two weeks, which is great as it means you can try something different each time. Obviously we'd only be going once, but there was still a lot of choice including a Thai dish. We stared off with bread, which I don't really need to go in to detail on, it was good, bready and buttery. For the main meal I had spinach, chard and Parmesan soufflé, crispy fried polenta with sage butter, grilled giant mushroom with green herbs, baked potatoes with green asparagus and a red wine and tomato sauce, sprinkled with black olives. Every single part of this dish was phenomenal, even the dreaded mushroom! My favourite part was the soufflé, it was bright green, fresh, cheesy and delicious.

Mr Hefs Spring Dish

I was with my boyfriend who as you may know hates vegetables and was not too happy about being dragged to a vegetarian restaurant, but even he was delighted when his food came. As he said, if it's well presented and looks edible he'll eat it. He had the braised creamy turnip tops and tomato pappardelle with broad bean sauce, bread crumbs, marinated buffalo mozzarella with basil and olive oil and baked carrots in garlic and ended up really enjoying it. I tried some (of course) and it was just as nice as mine, creamy pasta with fresh garlicy carrots, yum! I think what made it so delicious was that both of the dishes had such a variety of textures and tastes on the plate. It made every bite slightly different and full of flavour.

Another plus point of the restaurant was that it had a great selection of comics, incase you get bored of talking to your partner. Although he couldn't read them as they were in Dutch, my boyfriend had great fun deciphering what was going on and explaining it to me. 

Mr Hef reading some Tin Tin at dinner.

De Waaghals is quite expensive at around £18 for the main meals, but it is definitely worth it. So if you're ever in Amsterdam definitely put this on your agenda!

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Mildreds, Soho

I'm on holiday, woohoo. Not an actual abroad holiday, I'm just not working. But being on 'holiday' has made this week a very indulgent one, I've brought new clothes, done my room up a bit and of course I had to fit a good meal in. So off I went to London to meet vegan Emma, who had suggested going to Mildreds. I've read a few very good reviews before so I immediately said yes. From the other reviews I read, it seems like it gets very busy and you end up waiting for a table, we went very early (just before 5) so we didn't have any trouble, but by the time we left the place was buzzing!

Chargrilled roman style artichoke crostini

The restaurant is really cute and cosy which made me like it even before the food came. There was a good variety of dishes on the menu taking inspiration from all over the world and there was a lot of vegan/veggie options that can be turned into vegan options on the menu which meant Emma had a lot to choose from too! We decided to get 2 starters we both liked the look of so that we could share. So we had the tostada with grilled courgette and aubergine, lettuce, pico de gallo and guacamole and the chargrilled roman style artichoke crostini but with basil mayo instead of lemon aioli so that it was vegan. Both starters were so tasty, but overall I think the crostini won it for me, which is weird because as you may know I bloody love nachos and the tostada was like a massive one. But the lemony chargrilled artichoke, with crusty bread and basil mayo was the perfect start to the meal for me.

Tostada

Usually before I go to a restaurant I scour the menu online because I am notoriously bad at making up my mind, but because I didn't have time and the reviews had already sold it to me I didn't on this occasion. Despite this as soon as I saw the bean, tarragon and sundried tomato sausages served with celeriac mustard mash and cavolo nero with pear cider jus I knew it was the one for me. Mainly because I freaking LOVE mustard mash, cavolo nero and cider gravy, so there was no competition really! I don't think the picture does the portion size justice, it was huge and every element tasted amazing. I especially loved the celeriac mustard mash and the pear cider jus topped everything off with a hint of sweetness.

Bean Sausages and celeriac mash

Emma had the mixed mushroom, porcini and ale pie served with fries and mushy peas, which I tried despite my severe hatred for mushrooms. It was still delicious, especially the minted mushy peas!

Mushroom and ale pie

As you can imagine, after this point Emma and I could barely move, but the deserts looked so good we just couldn't pass them up. Luckily you can get desert to take away, so went went for that option and took them home with us to eat after we were on the safer side of fullness. This was the only part of the meal where I didn't go for the vegan option, but I couldn't pass up the chance to try the white chocolate and pistachio cheesecake. I'm glad I didn't because it was simply deeeelightful! The only problem was that I was still slightly full so I didn't manage to eat it all in one go. When I get too full I can't stand having food anywhere near me, so I moved it to the kitchen, however 5 minutes later I some how found myself eating it again, definitely the sign of a good cake! Emma had the banana and coconut tofu cheesecake, which she kindly let me try and I can confirm that it is also amazing!

Pistachio and white chocolate cheesecake

Banana and coconut tofu cheesecake

So if you happen to be in London any time soon, definitely give this one a go. Just get there slightly early so you don't have to wait for a table!

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