Cooking and eating things that don't involve meat and fish.
I firmly believe that it's perfectly possible to be a vegetarian and a foodie. No, I don't eat meat or fish - but I think that a good chef can be just as much an artist with vegetables, cheese and herbs than with lobster, lamb and steak. When we were lucky enough to get a table at Noma in 2009, the chefs there proved to me beyond all doubt that meat free cookery can be utterly inspiring and show off incredible produce in its most beautiful form.
In our house we're huge Great British Menu fans. It's the second best BBC programme after Doctor Who. Last year, we went to Glynn Purnell's excellent Birmingham restaurant and got to sample his winning pudding from 2008: egg custard, tarragon and black pepper. This year, on a whim, I booked us a 'gourmet break' at Nigel Haworth's Northcote Manor, where the amazing Lisa Allen is head chef. Northcote offers vegetarian counterparts to every menu item they offer, which puts it head and shoulders above so many other restaurants in my opinion.
We upgraded to the 7 course tasting menu, had canapes and champagne, ordered matching wines, had a cheese course and basically went all in. Somehow, the dishes were so perfectly sized, paced and full of fresh flavours that we only felt overly full mid-way through - after which we were presently with a welcome salad course and quickly recovered. Four hours later we were blissfully happy, rather pissed and got to overhear a little backstage gossip from GBM. A bit of a perfect evening really.
The best restaurants for vegetarians are the ones that don't make you feel like you're a hassle, make the effort to create as special and interesting food as your meat-eating dining companion’s and accept that we can be foodies too. Northcote is really one of the best.
Below are some pictures from the vegetarian tasting menu. Meat eaters can head to my boyfriend's blog for his take on the lobster, scallop carpaccio and beef cannon (he liked them), as well as better embedded pictures.
Wild mushrooms on toast, chevil puree.
Tomato consomme, courgette spaghetti, goat's cheese gnocchi.
Hot pot, carrot puree, red cabbage, tempura chive flower.
You can see the full set of pictures on Flickr.
Cooking and eating things that don't involve meat and fish.
Cooking and eating things that don't involve meat and fish.
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