Instalment of Two of I Know What You Ate Last Summer

Ta Da! More from London.

I was staying in a hotel with only a kettle, so I bought myself a bowl and spork and tried to enjoy my picnics on the floor. I got these things from the WholeFoods/Fresh'n'Wild in Soho.


My breakfasts - coffee and a Laura's muesli/tofu/strawberries pot - it was delish.



I loved this place - Ha Ha Veggie Bar in Camden Lock Market. Everything was vegan except the cheese, and it had some rocking vegan mayo. My friends Jess and Lachie ate too - we had felafels and burgers (with seedy handmade veggie pattie on a wholemeal roll) which were made when we ordered them by a lovely guy.

Ha Ha Veggie Bar: Camden Lock Market, Chalk Farm Road, Camden, London NW1.






From Planet Organic - a forgettable Laura's Sunball (sticky icky sweetness) and a really godawful sandwich - dry crumbly bread, dry beetroot, a swish of hummus and a real waste. Boo!


Some real junk (but good junk) ... RedVeg Burgers in Soho. Most things - burgers, fried, felafels, hot dogs - can be made vegan. The best thing about it is that it is a real fast-food style burger (if that's what you're after) - soft bun, textured dark brown pattie sans lentils or tofu, a bit o' lettuce, tangy mayo - but with coriander. The fried look like Macca's (good or bad - you decide!) and come in an open top cardboard cone.

Two things annoyed me about RedVeg. As the name implies, the shop is festooned with images of Che Guevara and Lenin, which I found a bit disturbing. I was uncomfortable with the conflation of veganism with controversial far-left figure, even if in a wry, trendy Soho way. It seemed like a) a blunt marketing tool, and b) a good way to continue the "veggie eating commie hippie" stereotype.

The second thing that got my goat was that the vegwursts and hotdogs were listed as vegetarian on the instore flyer, but vegan on the board above the counters. In a vegetarian shop this is not on.

You might note that the packaging changes from red to blue to red - ahh, EagleEyes, it is indeed form two different meals, carefully selected by your guide to demonstrate the wrapped, closed and open versions. The red versions had hickory sauce - sweet, smokey, real Down South ma'am.

RedVeg: 95 Dean Street, London, W1D 3TB.





Sheese from World Vegan Day. Meh. (Actually, the smoked cheddar was good enough for me to cart all the way home, so that was preemptive. The rest of it still didn't ring my bell though).

Instalment One: I Know What You Ate Last Summer

Having fallen shamefully behind with my overseas blogging, despite having faithfully recorded almost every mouthful I consumed, I now admit defeat and present a montage of New York and London eatering (is that jumping the shark?).

There are still a few proper reviews in the works, but to make sure that I didn't dutifully, publicly and sometimes a little embarassingly record and note every forkful and track down like a bloodhound all the eateries that I went to, here is the first instalment of an abridged, abbreviated and written-without-my-dear-notes series entitled "I Know What You Ate Last Summer".


This brand "Laura's Idea" was available in a number of supermarkets in London, including Planet Organic where I would plonk myself with my morning unsweetened-soy-latte and tofu-muesli pot. Not all of the products are vegan, but those that are are clearly labelled and you can tell that they're produced each day because the labels contain adorable and inconsistent typos. Bless!

VitaOrganic in Soho, London. My Bloody Mary -type juice took ages, but being entirely grumpy and cranky from the flight made me too grr-grr to complain very loudly. The selection of salads varied nicely and was served directly from pot to bowl.

A pita-pocket-sort-of thing from a deli on Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village. It was a bit like curried tofu and although soggy and falling apart, was surprisingly nice.

I was determined to try as many of the soy cheeses form WholeFoods as possible, blithely unaware that quite a lot of the soy cheeses contained casein, thus vastly reducing the number of vegan soy cheeses and really making me cross.



Tofurkey and Follow Your Heart soy cheese - chemicals on a plate.



That's all for Instalment One, folks. More slack writing and vague musings to follow.