Bwyty Fegan Newydd – New Vegan Restaurant

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Post by:

josh panel

Forgive the (possibly dodgy) Google translation in Welsh, but I was really excited about a new 100% vegan restaurant in Bangor, Wales. I reached out to the owners to find out what it was all about and here’s what they had to say:

We decided to open a vegan restaurant simply because it’s the right thing to do. We were tempted to hide behind the vegetarian safety net but decided to be brave and follow the heart. The support has been amazing and it turns out that there is certainly a demand for this modern cuisine. People are most certainly waking up to the effects our meat and dairy consumption is having on the planet. Also the health implications that processed meat is having and the disgraceful treatment of animals is appalling and needs to stop. We can’t always barge into slaughter houses or testing labs to protest but we can produce businesses that oppose such things. We can create easier ways for people to find cruelty free food.

Voltaire is vegan food but not typical vegan style, the food is actually more in keeping with regular restaurant food, it just happens to be vegan. Our meals are fusion, worldly and totally delicious! We wanted to create indulgent food, not just healthy. Food to treat yourself with! Creamy mushrooms and crispy battered cauliflower. Summer fruity curry with warmed naan, or Tibetan fried noodles with a choice of caramelised parsnip or non meat pieces. We love comfort food at Voltaire and our customers are our family.

I’m so pleased that they decided to take the 100% vegan route and the food sounds right up my alley. Check out the picture they sent me and another one I found on Instagram. I can’t wait to make my way to Bangor and get some of that beer-battered cauliflower!

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Like Voltaire on Facebook.

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Vegan sausage sizzle

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Australia has a strange custom.

Each weekend on the forecourt of countless home improvement and DIY hardware centres, people cook and sell sausages to raise money for charity. The act of cooking and selling sausages for charity in this manner is called a sausage sizzle.

Imagine a B&Q in the UK or Home Depot in the USA. Well, in Australia they have a chain of these centres called Bunnings and they are synonymous with people frying up sausages and serving them on white bread with ketchup for a couple of dollars.

This week I was amazed to see a sausage sizzle planned for outside a Bunnings store in my home town of Brisbane during which they will only cook and serve 100% vegan food.

Yes, it’s a vegan sausage sizzle!

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I’ve never been happier than when I got to type vegan sausage sizzle. It’s poetry.

This particular sausage sizzle is being staged to raise money for Animal Liberation Queensland. 

If I could make the world do one thing, it might just be to host more vegan sausage sizzles.

You can like Animal Liberation Queensland on Facebook.

Extra note: say ‘vegan sausage sizzle’ quickly five times in a row.

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Gourmet vegan food in Shoreditch

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Joey’s Kitchen is a newish food business run by a group of friends named Samantha, Fran and John. This terrific trio recently set up business with a residency at Joyeux Bordel cocktail bar in Shoreditch until the end of May 2016, plus there are a few other places where you will see them popping up.

“But what about the food!” I hear  you scream.

The menu is sparse but certainly not basic. The three items on offer include a homemade seitan hot dog, stacked nachos and their signature Jarlsberg style cheese grilled sourdough sandwich, all of which can be served loaded up with different toppings.

Menu

The people behind Joey’s Kitchen like to talk about their culinary influences, but one look at those toppings will give you all the info you need.

The food business started off a few years ago doing event catering and supper clubs and then just over 6 months ago moved into DIY Space for London, a south London arts and social centre. Joey’s Kitchen is based there every Saturday and Sunday during the day offering food, sweet stuff plus coffee and other drinks.

In addition, the foodies will soon be running a stall at the street food market in their local Leytonstone area and have lots of exciting other things on the cards for the coming months!

Wanna see the food at the Shoreditch pop up? Here you go!

All nachos Grilled cheese Hotdog Nachos

Investigate the gorgeous food of Joey’s Kitchen by getting along to their Shoreditch pop up. How can you say no to the above images?! Host venue website with address and hours here.

You can like Joey’s Kitchen on Facebook and follow them on both Twitter and Instagram.

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Personalised vegan meal plan in Leeds & Sheffield

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This news slid into my inbox a few days ago and I didn’t pay a lot of attention. I get a ridiculous amount of emails and press releases every day, so much in fact I find it difficult to really soak in the content of everything I see.

But for some reason I went back to this email for a closer look and I’m sure glad I did because now I can share news with you of this unique vegan meal plan service offered in both Leeds and Sheffield!

Nourish is a company with two outlets, one in Bond Street Leeds and the other in Pinstone Street Sheffield. Although not vegan restaurants, the Nourish outlets feature an impressive number of vegan-friendly menu items and everything plant-based is clearly marked.

But wasn’t I talking of a vegan meal plan service. Yes. Here it is.

Nourish has just launched a service where you take a meeting with their nutritionist and have your very own vegan meal plan developed just for you.

The meal plan provides clients with breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, drinks and supplements. You don’t go shopping, you just have to eat! Check out this sample three-day meal plan supplied to me by Nourish:

SAMPLE VEGAN MEAL PLAN (1) (1)

This appeals to me due to my laziness. I’d love all my meals prepared by a chef. I also love how it changes every day.

It would also appeal to vegans looking to explore their own personal nutrition, I suppose!

Get on over to the Nourish website to find out more info regarding the vegan meal plan program. You can also find the address for both restaurants in case you would like to pop in to try their vegan menu items before committing to the meal plan.

Nourish are also on Twitter.

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Two vegan snooker champions on Twitter

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What happens when two vegan snooker players cross paths on social media?

They discuss climate change being linked to excess methane, of course!

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You can follow Neil Robertson on Twitter here and Peter Ebdon on Twitter here.

Yay for vegan snooker players!

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Vegan pop up dinner in Walthamstow

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How about doing something wonderful for your belly this Saturday night?

Book your ticket and get along to this exquisite 3-course vegan supper club being hosted inside the Hornbeam Café in Walthamstow, East London.

The café regularly allows volunteers to take over the venue for special vegan dining experiences and with a Spring theme this weekend, you’ll want to make sure you are a part of it.

The menu this Saturday night includes:

Starter – Spring garlic soup with julienne spring vegetables and mushrooms

Main – A selection of sharing platters
Spring vegetable roll with peanut sauce – Docola (chickpea flan) – Roasted purple sprouting broccoli with chilli and garlic – Orange, carrot and watercress salad dressed with fennel and preserved lemon – Mixed leaf green salad with fresh herbs – New potatoes marinated in preserved lemons and coriander – Pakoras (crispy fried vegetables)

Dessert – Rhubarb and ginger fool topped with roasted hazelnut praline

This 3-course extravaganza will set you back only £20 or if you are not an adult, £10. Click here to book your spot now.

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The Hornbeam Café is at 458 Hoe Street in Walthamstow, E17 9AH. You can phone them on 020 8558 6880. The Spring vegan supper club is this Saturday 30th April, 2016 between 7:30pm and 9:30pm.

Book now to support vegan events, independent business and kick ass volunteers.

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Restaurant serving non-vegan food to vegans?

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This is not good news.

A group of friends in the USA were suspicious of their local vegan restaurant. The plant-eaters had a feeling they were being served products containing egg and milk, even though the restaurant explicitly advertised their entire menu as vegan.

You need to get over to this website to read the full exposé, but the highlight has to be the covert after hours dumpster dive to discover multiple food packets with non-vegan ingredient lists.

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Click photo for full story

I’m not sure how the owners and/or kitchen staff of Bamboo Kitchen thought they could get away with doing this or why they seemingly don’t give a damn about the ethical and health choices/requirements of their customers.

Word of warning to restaurants selling food to vegans. Make sure it’s vegan or we will find out and we will be mad.

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Pudology is spreading UK wide

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I adore Pudology desserts so I was happy to hear this news of their continued spread around the UK.

From today (Monday April 25, 2016) Pudology is part of a trial that Waitrose is running in 48 of its stores. The supermarket chain is putting all chilled free from products together in one space for the first time. Shoppers will be able to find their favourite dairy-free delicacies more easily.

Currently, Pudology can be found in six Waitrose stores with two of their products (Banoffee & Chocolate) but this trial means they will be launching the Millionaires Pud flavour into the 48 participating stores (at an awesome 25% off offer!). If the trial is a big success, the concept of a free from chilled section will be rolled out to more stores taking Pudology to even more people.

You can check out the Pudology website here.

pudology

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Fancy vegan restaurant in Berlin

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Post by:

joe panel

It’s not often that I go to a posh restaurant, being the scruffy hippy that I am. But when my mum visited Berlin in November, we took the opportunity to visit what might be Berlin’s finest vegan restaurant: Lucky Leek.

It’s to my shame that we’d not been before, as it’s only ten minutes walk from where we live and has almost exclusively enthusiastic reviews on Happy Cow. Yet somehow the occasion hadn’t arisen to pay the higher prices that such a classy joint demands. But in November we’d just returned from a visit to London, so all of a sudden the prices didn’t seem so high any more. (Everything in Berlin seems very cheap after a visit to London – in fact, I’m sure most Londoners who go to posh places would consider Lucky Leek a bargain.)

Our delay in visiting Lucky Leek is matched only by my delay in writing about it. My excuse is that I’ve been searching for the superlatives these past five months. Lucky Leek really is that good.

I can’t remember exactly what we ordered, but I do remember that it was all exquisitely presented and utterly delicious. We were brought a complimentary mini starter while we waited for the starter we’d ordered (creamy oyster mushroom soup, which arrived with some crispy deep-fried oyster mushrooms on the side), which was very nice of them.

One of my worries about posh places is that the portions will be tiny, but I’d say that’s not the case at Lucky Leek. The portions weren’t enormous but nor were they small – unlike some other classy restaurants I’ve been to – and we left feeling well fed. And again, everything was carefully presented.

The dessert stands out in my mind for some reason, especially that delicately decorated chocolate you can see in the photo. Some of the flavour combinations seemed odd when reading the menu, but the range of flavours worked very well together.

Our waiter was very friendly, and we were made to feel comfortable and welcome. The menu can seem a bit complex (it’s in English as well as German though, so don’t worry!) as it’s laid out like there are set menus – but we just chose what we wanted from each one, which was no problem.

So if you’re in Berlin and fancy splashing out on a really fancy meal, then put Lucky Leek on your list.

1 Lucky Leek Berlin amuse bouche 2 Lucky Leek Berlin starter mushroom soup 3 Lucky Leek main course 4 Lucky Leek Berlin main course 5 Lucky Leek Berlin dessert 6 Lucky Leek Berlin dessert

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Vegan restaurant owners not vegan

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There has been quite a bit of upset in vegan circles this week about the founders and majority owners of Southern California vegan restaurants Gracias Madre and Café Gratitude selling beef products (i.e. dead cows) from their family farm.

I reached out to the PR firm for Café Gratitude to find out a little more information about the situation. One of my main concerns was whether the plant-based menus were ever going to start serving meat.

Here is their response:

“We want to assure all of our supporters that Café Gratitude and Gracias Madre have always served and will continue to serve 100% organic, plant-based cuisine prepared with ingredients sourced responsibly from vendors and farmers who share our commitment to preserving the integrity of the environment.

Founders Matthew and Terces Engelhart do not personally follow a vegan diet. They reside on their privately-owned Be Love Farm in Vacaville, California where they practice regenerative agriculture, and harvest organic produce for personal consumption for friends, family and neighbors in the area.

Given the growth of the restaurants in Southern California, the majority of produce served at Café Gratitude and Gracias Madre is supplied by local farms with the exception of organic peaches in the summer, and organic butternut squash in the fall and winter months, which are both sourced from Be Love Farms.

To learn more about regenerative agriculture practices visit www.belovefarm.com and regenerationinternational.org.”

Apart from the horrible irony of animals being killed on a farm called Be Love, do you see a problem with eating at one of these restaurants? Is it effective to put financial pressure on the restaurant chain because the co-founders raise cows for food on their own farm or is this also putting unnecessary pressure on other co-owners who are are vegan or risking the jobs of vegan workers.

I eat at many vegan restaurants and from many vegan food companies where the owners or CEOs are not vegan. I could name half a dozen or so just off the top of my head. The CEO of Veggie Grill is not vegan. The owner of VegBar in Brixton is not vegan. Not everyone in a management position at Fry’s Family Foods is vegan. Some of the biggest vegan food brands on the planet are making profit for non-vegan investors who spend said profits on animal product consumption.

And what about our 100% vegan businesses with vegan owners? Should we be demanding that they do not buy produce from farms that also raise and kill animals for food?

This post is certainly not an attempt to tell people how to react to the Café Gratitude situation, but to create thought and debate. I would love to hear your thoughts on the topic. Should these restaurants stand alone and be celebrated for their plant-based menus or should vegans be demanding the founders and co-owners change their other business practises by applying financial pressure via a boycott?

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