Brighton 2011

Life is currently treating me very well indeed.

Lots of good things have been happening recently: @cherrivalentine moved in, I got a better job and have been off galavanting around the world!

Before this all happened, @cherrivalentine booked us a weekend in Brighton to celebrate my 30th. I started blogging about a few of the places we ate at a while ago, so this final post wraps up the rest.

We stayed at Paskins Townhouse, just off the seafront. The room was very pleasant, complete with 4 poster bed and sea view (just about, if you stick your head out the window!).

We'd heard good things about their vegan breakfast, but we weren't impressed enough to bother going down on the second morning and opted for a lie in instead:

We'd planned to check out VBites on the way down, but were running short on time so ate some redwoods food straight from the packet in the car instead ;)

We revisited Terre-a-terre on the first evening, and I'm pleased to say that service was a lot better than last year. Unfortunately the menu selection not so good. We ended up having Tapas for main course, due to a complete lack of vegan mains we fancied eating.

The starters we ordered were:

Arepas Chilli Candy (v/gf) 8.95
Deep fried corn cakes rolled in spice dust served with chilly chelly jelly, avocado and lime mayonnaise, chilled pokey gazpacho hash and a candied chilli.

Good Thyme Trifle and Baby Beets (v/gf) 8.95
Warm carrot cream custard layered with macadamia lemon thyme crumble, sweet pickled baby beets and radishes, micro salad and herbs, served with linseed crackers. Delicious!

The corn cakes looked great, but seriously lacked flavour. Carefully rationing out the stingy amount of chilli jelly you get with them however improves the overall effect no end. The carrot custard was the highlight of the dishes - it was one of the best things I tried over the weekend.

Tapas was tapas - pretty much the same as last year's and unfortunately for us a rehash of starters!

The corn cakes came this time with chilli sauce, which worked a lot better. Again we got more custard, which was welcomed but it would have been good to try a few more things! Our favourite part was the noodles, which we'd certainly order again.

The desserts were pants. Seriously Terre-a-Terre, if you're reading this: go across the road to Aloka and try their raw vegan desserts - no competition! At the very least, keep your gorgeous frangipane on the menu at all times.

Everyone loves the churros, except me. I like a good donut as much as the next person, but these are no better than those you can get in co-op at 5 for 69p (often 10 for £1). Adding insult to injury they don't give you enough churros for the amount of chocolate sauce. Finally, what's with the cherries in vodka? We ate one each and left the rest. Am I missing something?

The other dessert we had was well presented, but essentially fruit salad & sorbet (grown).

Terre-a-Terre's still a great place to visit and I'll continue to rank it highly, but it really is a shame they don't ensure a good selection of vegan options at all times.

Going back I wouldn't feel confident I'd get 3 courses of fabulous food, please sort it out!