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Monday 29 August 2011

A Vegan Eating out

Not living in a city and being Vegan can be hard. Eating out I have often ended up with a bowl of chips or a bowl of plain veg. Most restaurants will have 1 or 2 veggie options but 9 times out of 10 they aren't Vegan and will have eggs, cheese, milk, cream etc in them.

I decided that this bank holiday I would find somewhere not too far away where I could have more choice. I found Veggie World. Only a 45 minute drive from where we live we decided to spend the day in Milton Keynes shopping then head on to the restaurant.

The location was not great- kind of stuck in the 90's and the restaurant wasn't snazzy decor but I wasn't looking for that. When we were given the menu I was pretty taken aback that I could choose 98% of the menu! I've not had that since I went Vegan. The restaurant is Chinese cuisine which was fine by me as that was one of my favourite pre-vegan. You can see the menu here.

We ordered the mixed starter first of all which consisted of crispy seaweed, veggie spare ribs, veggie "chicken" satay, wontons and veggie spring rolls. All brilliant!!!!


Next we shared the Veggie crispy "duck". Now when I went vegan Crispy duck was one of the things I knew I would miss a lot. Not now!!! This stuff was amazing, it had all the flavour and all the crisp! 10 out of 10.


I had Satay "prawn" with rice for my main. Now I knew it wasn't prawn but it really hit the spot. It's hard to explain really. But I really enjoyed it.


Phil had Crispy Chilli "beef" with rice. No joke this tasted exactly like real crispy chilli beef. Seriously.




I'm so glad we decided to go there. I now know there is somewhere i can go without feelling awkward, having to explain to ignorant waiters what Vegan is, feeling people are judging me for the way I want to eat. I can't tell you how happy it made me. The best thing is that Phil (meat eater through and through) loved it. I think it blew his mind a little. I know deep down he expected it to be substandard. I'm so glad we both could go out and have a great meal together. it cost about £30 for both of us with a couple of drinks. I can't wait to go back :-)

4 comments:

  1. Hi Jess - sounds really interesting, this; glad you guys had a smashing evening out and most importantly that you had free run of the menu!

    Think there's a blogpost for me in there too, somewhere (you know I'm an omnivore and that I love food, but there's something about the concept that I can't quite yet put my finger on just now) - I'll have to have a bit of a think and see...

    How was the service, though? Aside from the fact that it's almost certainly been the best and most accommodating restaurant, menu-wise, you've encountered since you took the plunge - how was it overall? I always like to hear about people's restaurant reviews, especially places that are new to me!

    Glad all seems to be going well - look after yourself, kid!

    Westy xx

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  2. Thanks for the comment Westy :-)
    Service I would rate at 7 out of 10. While we were there we had 2 waitresses. One was brilliant, really nice and smiley but the other seemed a little grumpy. It seemed they got a lot of regulars in there as a lot of them they greeted by names. One thing they had which I hate is paper tablecloths. I know it wasn't pretending to be a 5 star restaurant but spend 30 quid on some proper table cloths and I would have been a lot happier.

    Hope you guys had a good bank holiday weekend? x

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  3. And that's fair enough - I think that's something which can be said about many Chinese restaurants, actually. Quite a few I've visited could be improved (and thus the dining experience improved) hugely out of proportion of the minimal cost involved just by using some half-decent linen and looking at the little details. And a smile costs nothing, of course... Good review - thanks!

    But yes, we certainly did have a good weekend; spent it in York with Jo, we had a wonderful couple of days wandering about, meeting up with old friends and doing dreadfully touristy things. Splendid.

    Anyway, York - which leads neatly into what I'd come back here to talk about! Here's another place you might find worthwhile visiting, if ever you're in the neighbourhood - yes, a good veggie-vegan place, but more importantly (from my perspective at least) they cook bloody good food!

    El Piano, York (www.el-piano.com); smashing Spanish/North African food - not quite yer average tapas place, something which seems much more authentic (you really have to go there to see what I mean). Warm, friendly ambience with attentive service and a team who genuinely care about what they're doing!

    They've recently gone full vegan (which means they've dropped the lovely feta & tabbouleh salad they used to do when I lived in York a few years back - and they no longer serve the spicy, almost crunchy manchego which went down singing hymns every time) but everything else remains the same, in many ways - it's a lovely place to go and enjoy a good meal. That the meal includes no meat (or of late, no animal products whatever) is really irrelevant. It's more - so much more - than that...

    If you get the chance, go there!
    xx

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  4. It's wonderful to be able to order anything off the menu without having to ask the waiter tons of questions!
    Glad you enjoyed it.

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