Pizza Face (Brighton)

Whilst on a pizza posting spree, it's only fair to mention Brighton's vegan friendly takeaway also.

Pizza Face is an omni pizza chain with branches in Kemp Town (Brighton) and Hove. They stock Redwoods vegan cheese, which can be substituted for normal for £1 extra. They've a separate vegan menu available on Mondays & Tuesdays (with fake meats as well as cheese) - it's too bad they don't do this on a weekend.

We visited at 10.45pm on a Saturday evening in November, towards closing time of 11pm. We ordered a couple of pizzas, garlic bread and tub of Boho Gelato sorbet to eat at our hotel nearby. We've heard rumours that they can deliver directly to the beach, but it was a bit chilly for that!

I'm not entirely sure why the garlic bread came with rosemary and it needed about 10x the amount of garlic on for my taste, but the bread itself was really good:

The pizzas however we're so good. With all the rave reviews about Pizza Face from people we know, hopefully we just got unlucky. Either way, the amount of toppings on both our pizzas was pitiful:

Having paid extra for vegan cheese there was hardly any on there, with a good few inches around the edge completely bare. Even the amount of tomato sauce was stingy. Compare this to somewhere like Mr Singh's where you get toppings right to the edge (not to mention two 12" for £13.49) and you'll understand why we felt a bit short changed.

We left half our pizzas each to move onto dessert. We often do this and eat the other half the following morning (pizza improves with age!).

I love Mojitos - they're easily my favourite cocktail. For a drink with so few ingredients it's impressive how badly people manage to screw them up however - they typically range in bars from mediocre to undrinkable (with exceptions - I found a stunningly good mojito bar in Leith last year). Sadly Boho Gelato's mojito sorbet falls into the inedible camp - we managed about of third of the tub between us before admitting defeat and leaving it to defrost. I don't know if the ingredients had been mixed wrong or what, but it tasted disgusting.

I want to love Pizza Face, but it's all a bit to 'meh' for me - the halves we kept went in the bin. I hate giving places a bad review and it's possible that towards the end of the shift we got unlucky. I'll try and give it a go on a Monday / Tuesday night some time - hopefully on vegan night things will be a lot better.

Metrodeco (Brighton)

We've walked past & peered through Metrodeco's windows several times before - admiring it's charm, decor and comfy looking furniture; quietly jealous of contented omni customers sipping drinks and enjoying cake inside.

Why don't we get afternoon tea at the seaside too? Actually it seems we do :)

Metrodeco's an eclectic/eccentric looking tea room in Kemp Town, a 10 minute walk from the centre of Brighton and short stroll from the beach. Not only have we walked past previously but stayed twice at Paskins on the same road. Thanks to a tip off from the Interweb & prior notice instructions on their site we phoned at booked the evening before (whilst gorging ourselves on what the waiter at Terre-a-terre described as "quite a lot of food"!).

4pm on a Saturday in November and the place was almost full, so we were pleased to see that they'd reserved some of the comfiest looking armchairs for us. Tea selection's impressively large and those that we tried were good (high praise for a tea hater like me) - @cherrivalentine regrets not buying some for home.

I'm never quite sure how much food to expect for afternoon tea, but advice for Metrodeco is to go hungry! Portion size is generous and more than just a snack - have a light lunch and book dinner for later in the evening, or else you may be forced into the same travesty / crime against veganism by not being able to eat all the cake!

How cool is that? Far from being the weirdos in the corner with our weirdo food, our's looked as good or better than anything other people were eating.

We started with the sandwiches - pesto & artichoke were my favourite. The bread was fresh and flavours good. Hummous made its obligatory appearance but it there's nothing wrong with that if there's variety too.

The scones looked the part and cut easily. They could have done with being over so slightly moister, but it was a good effort all the same.

We were pleased to see that they've vegan spread - if in the future they had rice whip too it'd be scone perfection.

And onto the cake - which was nothing short of stunning. Moist, crumbly texture, not too sweet and oodles of flavour. If you don't go for a full afternoon tea I highly recommend going for a slice of cake and cup of tea (though ring to check they've vegan cake in).

Supposedly our vegan version was smaller than their standard afternoon tea, so they dropped the standard price of £18 a head to £15 for the vegan version, which we think's very reasonable indeed!

We'll definitely return when next in the area and in the meantime suggest that you do too! Metrodeco's an example of omnis doing vegan food right. Looking forward to trying it in summer whilst it's still light outside.

VBites (Brighton)

To say we've been apathetic about trying VBites is somewhat of an understatement. Whilst outside Brighton (Hove) there was simply no chance - now opposite Terre a Terre in Aloka's old building it was getting warmer. When they announced they had a Sunday roast with vegan yorkshire puds, finally we were sold.

So, I'll start this post with the good (it gets progressively worse) - their yorkshires are stunning.

Far removed from the usual vegan 'tastes like a yorkshire but looks like a hocky puck', their's are crisp on the outside, fluffy on the inside and with just the right amount of stodge. I don't know how they do it (I suspect Vegg may be involved), but their yorkshires are simply perfect. Please Redwoods - make these a product we can buy in shops.

Now the bad: we got one each. Seriously, we could have eaten a plate full of them each with gravy and left with massive smug grins on our faces. Instead, what surrounded the single yorkshire is what can only be described as the experience that is: VBites.

First I'll explain the apathy part. We love Redwoods - long before the company was bought and the name was changed we've bought their products. Our fridge always has their fake meats and we've gotten through at least a block of their cheese each week since they introduced 'super melting' in 2004.

The problem however, is that 99% of the point of eating out is getting food you can't (be bothered to) make at home - not a (poor, overpriced) version of what you eat on a weeknight. VBites (the restaurant) got bad reviews early on for being Redwoods heated up - I'm sorry to confirm that nothing's changed.

The rest of the meal was shit. Having booked for 12pm and arrived at 11.58 we stood waiting for 10 minutes whilst their staff purposely ignored us. Despite there being several milling around and several empty tables, the only one interacting with customers was operating a strict 'one at a time' policy - we only wanted to know which table to sit at. We *almost* walked out - if Moshimo wasn't now 'Made with Fishlove' we would have done.

Finally seated we ordered milkshakes which turned out to be Swedish Glace in a glass. Actually they were surprisingly good, so despite the frosty welcome we decided to give them a second chance.

Decor is a cheaper version of Aloka (they did cease trading though I guess). Gone are the Verner Panton chairs but the building itself retains its character and it's good to see details such as some of the lighting intact.

Did I mention the yorkshires? They were amazing. The rest was horrible. It was like Bird Seed had come back to haunt us. Where to start?

The deep fried potatoes is as good a place as any. Hard (not crispy) on the outside and barely cooked on the inside. I Love roast potatoes - they're usually the best thing about a roast. These however were offensive. To add insult to injury, they forgot to include any on one of the plates - not that that really mattered as I couldn't stomach more than one.

If they weren't deep fried I don't know what they'd done to them, but either way: it was a crime against roast potatoes.

The veg tasted like it'd come ready chopped in a bag from Iceland (the shop, not the country), ready to boil.

I left most of mine and we skipped dessert.

VBites: fantastic products - innovative, tasty, well respected amongst vegans. Naff restaurant.

Sea Spray (Brighton)

I used to pity people who visit the same resort each year - stay at the same place, eat the same food - visit the same shops, do the same things. There's got to be more to life than that, surely?

The irony of growing old(er) however is that occasionally you find somewhere so good that it's worth returning to over an over; where it's not much the familiarity that makes it fun, it's knowing in advance that it'll be effortlessly awesome.

This year we branched out slightly - not only changing room but to an entirely different hotel (risqué I know!) Having abandoned hope of a room with roll top bath & wood burning stove we lowered our expectations and opted for a room with balcony overlooking the pier (note railing in the foreground of the pic above). Two nights (Fri/Sat) cost us about £350 inc breakfast (which in age old tradition we slept through on Sunday).

Sea Spray's a few streets away from Paskins; slightly closer to the centre of Brighton. Like Paskins it also does a cooked vegan breakfast (not that this is strictly needed in Brighton, where you'll inevitably be eating a massive lunch a couple of hours later). Parking's expensive and on street only, costing a further £20. We were lucky enough to get a space directly outside the 1st night but had a 5 minute walk on the 2nd.

According to TripAdvisor the rooms vary massively - the general advice being to avoid the basement! We we quite pleased with our 1st floor room - whilst I'm not convinced that they fully pulled off the "Renaissance" theme that they were aiming for it was large, light and airy. The king sized bed was impressively comfortable and I got the best sleep I've had in a hotel in ages:

That view was too expense to only show once:

Breakfast was alright but fairly uninspiring (Paskins' is better). The first "vegan breakfast" came with fried eggs - the 2nd attempt looked a lot like this:

Would we stay there again? Maybe. I'm not sure it's worth the extra over Paskins - however comfortable the bed. Next time we may branch out further and go somewhere without vegan food - there's always cake to be eaten in town.

Brighton 2012

The weather this summer's been pretty crap in the UK. Occasionally there's a bright spell, but it's mostly been grey, wet and uncomfortably warm. Still, we chanced it anyway and had a couple of breaks on the South coast - a very wet and miserable week in Dorset and a slightly more favorable weekend in Brighton.

I've blogged about Brighton's vegan friendliness at least once before, so this post is more a photo montage of new stuff than a rehash of old.

Not only did we stay in the same B&B as last year, but randomly (due to it being the only 4 poster room available) the exact same room too. Even more randomly, I'm not the only uk vegan blogger that's slept in the that very same bed, multiple times! Decor's been improved slightly, but desperately needs a new mattress:

Other than lots of shopping; we took an impulse ride on the Brighton Wheel:

Ate Aloka mint choc chip icecream on the beach:

Drank booze and ate lemon cheesecake on the beach:

Continued the booze-a-thon in Terre a Terre (highly recommend Vintage Roots Fleury rose champagne):

Had lunch at Wai Kika Moo Kau (remembering not to order the ridiculously huge chilli burger this time):

Ate raw desserts at Aloka:

Had we known that Aloka was about to close we'd have had a full meal there :(

I've posted a couple of reviews of other places we visited whilst in Brighton for the weekend - see below!

Food for Friends (Brighton)

We last visited Food for Friends back in March (I thieved the above photo from my previous post), vowing to return for an evening meal. Having visited more than a decade ago I'd avoided it for years as their vegan choices failed to inspire. Back in March we were impressed by the desserts we tried, so decided to give it the benefit of the doubt.

They've currently a 3 courses for £19.99 offer, which seemed too good to miss. We broke the golden rule of never ordering the same thing and went for the same starter:

Tofu Pockets (v,gf)
Sweet tofu cases; one filled with brown basmati rice, oyster mushrooms, and spring onions, the other with smoked tofu coriander and wasabi rice, both served with enoki mushrooms, sweet pickled cucumber, ginger and mirin dressing

As a lover of Inarizushi the beancurd pouches (although slightly unorthodox) didn't disappoint. Surrounding it was what can best be described as deconstructed sushi, which sadly translated to be more lazy than genius. Still, the overall dish was visually appealing and I would eat it again.

There was only one vegan main course option:

Courgette, Tomato and Cannelini Bean Cassoulet (v,n)
With a crispy rosemary polenta cake, basil pesto, steamed summer greens and topped with a fresh broad bean and parsley salsa

As far as cassoulet goes; this was one of the best I've ever tasted. Overall flavour was delicious, with plenty of perfectly cooked ingredients.

It should however have been a starter, with a selection of crusty bread - it didn't really hold up as a main course on its own. The polenta cake it came with was tiny and did nothing to soak up the lovely gravy. We ordered a bread basket to eat it with, but it wasn't particularly good quality and didn't really work as we hoped.

The only vegan desserts were those that we tried last time:

Rich dark chocolate truffle torte (v,n)
Baked on a hazelnut biscuit base served with berry compote

Hot cinnamon apple and pear fritters (v,gf,s)
Served with vanilla ice cream and a sweet sesame sauce

Both appeared slightly different to last time, but their fritters are still exceptionally good (the batter on Terre a Terre's banana fritters is poor in comparison).

For £20 a head Food for Friends is great value. For such a long established vegetarian restaurant with so much competition nearby the vegan options however remain uninspiring. They also don't seem to change very often, which is a shame considering that it professes to be a seasonal menu.

If they add some more options then we'd happily return. Until then there's just too many other places with more adventurous vegan menus a short walk away.

Moshi Moshi (Brighton)

As if Brighton needs any more vegan food options! I don't generally review non-vegetarian restaurants, unless they've an extensive list of vegan options on the standard menu and are genuinely worth visiting. Despite all of the exclusively vegetarian places nearby; Moshi Moshi definitely falls within this category.

The building's architecture is loosely based on shoin-zukuri style, with large glass walls (decorated to look like shoji screens) that can be slid outwards when weather allows. On a rainy day it looks a little odd, but if you google image search "Moshi Moshi Brighton" you'll see what I mean. Inside the single room is full of light, with a large conveyor belt system around the centre and standard tables around the edge:

Many of the vegan dishes are on the conveyor, however we opted for a table instead and ordered items specially to ensure they'd been prepared specifically for vegans. Unfortunately this meant that each item was full price rather than discounted, but it was worth it for peace of mind.

Service was quick, friendly and attentive. Dishes took 5-10 minutes to be prepared from ordering, which meant we were able to order additional ones once we'd figured out what we did and didn't like.

We started with a vegan sushi set and a few other dishes from around the menu:

Faroes £10.30
Mushroom teriyaki, natto & spring onion gunkan; tofu teriyaki nigiri;
vegetarian, inari, 2 ume plum & cucumber and 2 tofu, mizuna , sun dried tomato,
red onion & cucumber maki

Edamame salted soy beans £2.90
Pop these beans out of their pods to enjoy this superfood

Chilli Noodle £2.90
Chilled somen noodles in a hot flavored spicy Korean sauce on a bed of cucumber

Crispy vegetable gyoza dumplings £3.20
Little parcels of finely chopped vegetables, lightly fried

We then ordered extra inari maki (my favourite) and umi temaki (Cherry's favourite):

Temaki: Ume pickled plum & cucumber £2.40

Maki: Inari tofu, celery, red radish, lettuce & kampyo £2.40

I've always like inarizushi (beancurd pouches filled with rice), but inari tofu is like all kinds of awesome.

We ate and enjoyed the whole meal, costing under £35 including soft drinks. On Mondays and Tuesdays it's currently half price, which is exceptional value.

The edamame beans weren't as good as Ping Pong's, but everything else was as good as or better than we've tried elsewhere. Even the natto wasn't offensive (though I still don't know why you voluntarily would order it on its own!).

Brighton has many vegan food choices, but we'll definitely be returning to Moshi Moshi again when we're next down. It's currently my favourite only to Terre a Terre - I'd choose it over Itadaki-Zen in London any day.

Terre a Terre (Brighton)

I eat out at least twice a week, but generally don't reblog restaurants over an over. Terre a Terre gets a yearly mention however, because its food is simply amongst the best in the UK.

Our latest trip was under the guise of Brighton Vegfest, which we travelled down from the Midlands for the day for (see separate post).

We'd eaten dessert at Food for Friends an hour before sitting down for a 3 course meal at Terre a Terre, so it's safe to say we were pretty stuffed.

In my last blog post I complained about the lack of vegan options - that sometimes there's a few, other times a distinct lack. This time however almost ever item on the menu was either V or VO! I doubt they've taken on board my comments personally, but hopefully the overall message has gotten through and this trend will continue.

The menu choice is large, however there's a definite re-use of ingredients between dishes. Perhaps we got unlucky or ordered the wrong things, but it'd be good to experience new flavours with each course.

I'm nit picking - this trip was our best ever to Terre a Terre. I'm glad we don't live closer (could get expensive), but with the recent closure of Saf; London really does need another 'high end' option to rival Manna V.

Is that the supreme master sitting behind @cherrivalentine?

We ordered a couple of starters:

Tarator Tomatoes (v) 6.10
Smoked Sundried tomatoes with beetroot, walnut and flat leaf parsley tarator and focaccia fingers.

Bison Bon Bon Beet’s (gf/vo) 8.95
Pumpkin terrine tarator with bison beetroot vodka verrine, slipcote sheeps cheese bon bons soaked in dill oil with caraway pepper salt, served with a sage onion fritter biscuit, brittle walnut crumble and apple balsamic.

Due to a mix up, we got an extra starter for free (if we'd have been starving this would have been perfect!):

Smoked Tomato and Rocket Salad (vo/gf) 6.10
Leafy salad of rocket, lashings of herbs and smoked tomatoes, shaved Grana Padano dressed with lemon and extra virgin olive oil scattered with tamari oven roasted pumpkin and sunflower seeds

This was the best - by far. Horseradish icecream is not something I've had the pleasure of trying before, but it really did work with the middle column. On the left was the aforementioned tomato paste (which I'm not sure really worked) and on the right a shot of vodka tasting beatroot soup. I mentioned previously my bemusement at Terre's obsession with using neat vodka in dishes. It was just a little too strong for us - with less vodka it'd have been more edible.

I let my obsession with bread get the better of me with this dish, which was more of a 'nibbles for 2 to share' than starter in its own right:

I've eaten far, far better focaccia, but far worse too. I'd class it Tesco standard rather than Waitrose (although both companies seem to be using the same supplier currently). This is the one dish where the tomato 'tarator' actually worked for me - it made the bread a lot more tasty. The smoked sundried tomatoes were new to me - definitely nice to try.

The token salad was pretty nice. The tofu was the best part, although in stingy quantity (we counted 3 pieces):

Main course didn't quite hit the spot for me. It was good to see a lot more choice, but it was my least favourite part:

Aubergine Dengaku (v/gf) 14.50
Slow soft sake baked aubergine sizzled with tahini, sesame and white miso finish served with edamame and yuzu pesto, sesame ginger dressed Arame Wakame vegetable thread salad and a hibiscus, amchur, nori salt dusted puffed rice seaweed cracker.

Bison and Beet Rosti (gf/vo) 14.65
Crispy fried potato, onion and garlic rosti topped with sage baked butternut squash, walnut beetroot and smoked tomato tarator. Finished with fresh slipcote sheeps cheese and beetroot bison vodka sauce.

I've not tried one of their rostis before, which seem to be a standard part of the menu. Frankly, I don't really understand it - it's not something I associate with restaurant food. It also seemed to be an amalgamation of our starters - the same beatroot soup (without the strong vodka taste), some of the salad, tofu and a big splodge of the tomato paste.

It wasn't as much of a miss as last year's main course across the road at Aloka, but I wouldn't order it again - not for £15.

I can't really comment on @cherrivalentine's main as I don't really like aubergine very much! :)

The noodle salad with it was very good though - we've had it before as part of the meze and were pleased to see it again.

I was uncomfortably full by this point. There were 2 desserts, one of which was churros (which I personally don't understand - see previous post for details). I was delighted to see frangepane though:

Frangipane Sizzle Dates (gf/v) 6.85
with mint tea granita and lemon and mint pomegranate gazpacho.

A couple of years ago I had the most amazing frangipane at Terre a Terre - I've been looking forward to its return since. I was therefore disappointed to find when it arrived that it was actually just a couple of dates with paste inside:

This dessert really hit the spot though. The dates were warm, sticky and delicious. Honestly I don't think I could have fit a frangipane tart anyway! The crushed minty ice was refreshing and a perfect way to finish the meal. The pomegranate and berries were good too, although 'gazpacho' is a slight over exaggeration :)

I'm really pleased to see more vegan choice on Terre a Terre's menu. More desserts would be welcome though and an explanation of what the vegan option is on the menu would be extremely useful. Their substitutions are for the most part reasonable (unlike a recent trip to The Warehouse in Birmingham, where the dish just totally didn't work without the strong taste of cheese), but if you know what's coming then you can plan around duplication of ingredients.

We left feeling full and content - the bill was not at all bad considering the quality of food we'd eaten. Open a branch in The Midlands please!