After planning on cooking up some tasty food at home this weekend I somehow ended up eating out for every meal! I feel a little ridiculous but it was a great weekend and now I have plenty of food in the fridge to last for the rest of the week.
After a late night dancing like crazy to 90's grrrl rock and pop at Traumfrau Nick and I managed to get up at a fairly decent time on Saturday morning to head up to London for a spontaneous lunch. We met up with one of my favourite cookbook authors and the kick ass vegan behind The PPK, Isa Moskowitz, her boyfriend and travel partner John of Laziest Vegans fame, Quarry Girl and her partner Nick.
We decided on Mildred's and managed to get a table in the middle of the lunch rush despite the queue. The key to getting seated right away seems to be to go with a group, they'll seat you in the light & airy upstairs dining room too which is a real win.
I've been visiting Mildred's for years so I was surprised and excited to see some new dishes on the menu. Almost everyone ordered the brand new Bangers and Mash dish and it was a great choice.
The mash was perfectly creamy, no sign of lumps here, the sweet tofu, apple and bean sausages were substantial without being heavy and even Nick, hater of all greens, loved the kale. The sweet pear jus really tied everything together nicely and I'd definitely order this again.
For me the real highlight of the meal was dessert. It's no secret that two of my favourite flavours are chocolate and peanut butter (I even spread PB onto my chocolate rice cakes!) so this new dessert was a real treat. The Chocolate and Peanut Butter Brownie is served with chocolate sauce AND ice cream, craziness!
Usually the ice cream accompanying this menu item is vanilla but that day they had chocolate on the specials menu and they were happy to switch it for me. I felt like I was living out all of my dessert dreams!! The perfectly crackle topped brownie and the chocolate sauce were both served hot making for a gooey and delicious dessert. I couldn't find fault with it if I tried, honestly, it was perfect.
After lunch I met up with one of my bff's, Sal from Alien On Toast, for a little wander around Chinatown before heading back to my place for an evening of silliness, snacks and chick flicks. It was awesome especially as Nick took charge of the kitchen and fried up batch after batch of delicious dumplings.
The next morning we woke up late and after much discussion about our favourite ways to eat potatoes we took our hungry asses down the road to WaiKikaMooKau for breakfast.
The WaiKika breakfast has always been one of my favourites and for some reason I haven't blogged about it since 2009! That's four years ago! Ridiculous! The breakfast has changed a little since then, the sausages, pesto tomato, mushrooms, toast and beans have stayed the same but now this full English comes with some delicious oven baked marinated tofu and instead of french fries it's accompanied by a much more appropriate hash brown.
This was such a perfect start to the day and it made me think that I need to go out for breakfast way more often! As well as being delicious it was also super filling and kept me going until Nick finished work. As soon as he walked in the door I demanded that he turn around because I had falafel on my mind. Never one to say no to falafel we were on our way in seconds. We've been eagerly awaiting the opening of Brighton's latest falafel joint, Fil Fil, in the old Red Veg location on Gardner Street for months and it finally opened this weekend.
As with any brand new restaurant there were a few teething problems, staff being unsure what vegan means and running out of hummus aren't great but what we did try made our trip worthwhile.
We ordered the 'meal deal' for £4.50 which is a falafel sandwich with hummus, salad, and a drink. Nick also got fries which he got to eat most of! I chose the wholewheat pitta which was served warm and stuffed full of fried falafel balls and a salad of fried onions, red cabbage, tomato & cucumber. Gherkins were also an option that day and by the look of the online menu they also have beetroot, lettuce, sweetcorn and olives to choose from.
I loaded up on tahini sauce both to make up for the lack of hummus and because tahini sauce is delicious. I also threw on a couple of blobs of amazingly strong garlic sauce.
It was a good falafel sandwich, the garlic and tahini sauces were both really flavourful and the falafel balls themselves were perfectly crispy and delicious. This place is definitely promising, I love that it's is a family run place rather than part of a chain but I'd like to see them gain a better understanding of their vegan options.