Restaurant Reviews

Life has been very full and exciting of late. As such, this blog was sort of put on the back burner a little. Now I'm back, I'm quitting Facebook and I hope to devote a little more time to getting this this up and running.

I'd like to start back with a couple of restaurant reviews.

Eggless Dessert Cafe, Adelaide, South Australia

During my "down time" The Beard and I went to Australia with his family, to visit some of their relatives. A wonderful time was had by all. Australia is absolutely excellent for vegan food. The nearest big city (Adelaide) had a whole tonne of veg eateries and the supermarkets were positively brimming with delicious animal-free goodies.

As soon as it was decided that we were going, we did our usual thing of hopping on to happycow.net to get an idea of where to go. This place really stood out and we looked forward to it for months.

Eggless is a late night cafe that specialises, as the name suggests, in egg-free and vegan-friendly desserts. Its opening hours are listed as "8pm til late" and on the two occasions on which we visited there was a small gathering outside the door waiting for it to open. It is clearly a hugely popular little place (appealing to vegan, pure veg and asian communities as well as anyone else who just likes a good pud) and filled up very quickly. Despite clearly being run off their feet, the staff were very friendly and great at their jobs. They have a menu that changes month-by-month, as well as a short list of asian desserts and savouries that remain on the menu permenantly.

The food was out of this world. Between us, we powered our way through the Sticky Black Rice Sundae, Turkish Delight Ice Cream, Raspberry and Lemon Quinoa Cake, Chocolate Yogo Cake and Gingerbread Pudding. They were bloody gorgeous and the portion sizes were just right, as well as being very easy on the wallet.

I can't rate Eggless highly enough. If you're ever in the area, just go. You won't regret it.


My Kitchen, Leigh-On-Sea, Essex

Closer to home, My Kitchen is a long-time favourite of ours. We try to head there as often as we can. Thought I'd drop in a quick review as we went again recently and it rekindled my love for it.

My Kitchen is run by an impossibly energetic and slightly bonkers chef. He worked there back when it was still Cafe Pulse and took over to create a completely different beast. The atmosphere now is clean and stylish whilst still warm and welcoming - an ever-changing selection of art adorns the walls and the stereo purrs with delicious rootsy americana. The menu is sufficiently varied to cater to all tastes and frequently changes. Seasonal seems to be the key word here, but at the same time a few favourites pop up all year round.

Last time we went we both had the falafel starter. In a review of this restaurant I wrote for another website I waxed lyrical about the falafel, and I'm pleased to say that the quality of it has been consistently good on each subsequent visit. I don't know how he does it, but somehow it manages to beat the everloving crap out of any other falafel I've ever had (and I'm a girl that eats a LOT of falafel). Just grand.

For mains I had another staple favourite of mine - Mushroom and Ale suet pudding - while The Beard had the Beetroot and Red Pepper burger. The burger was absolutely unbelievable; it sounds like a really odd mix of flavours (especially for a burger) but it worked SO well. The suet pudding... well, it became my favourite for a reason. The pud itself was perfect - crisp on the outside, light and fluffy on the inside. The filling was perfectly flavoured and very more-ish.

Everything was served promptly and the staff were as friendly as ever. I'm sure I'll write more about this place in future posts as I'm hoping to go back soon. I absolutely adore My Kitchen and am always extremely happy to give them my custom.


That's all for now. Hopefully now that things are settling down a bit I'll have more time to update. There's a few recipes I'm keen to share soon, so stay tuned!