London’s In the Height of the Storm: Jonathan Pryce & Eileen Atkins Break Your Heartsby Randi / November 15, 2018British Stereotype Overload: Afternoon Tea at the Ritz (Vegan Version!)
Most Americans and other non-Brits, when they think of England, think of fancy tea parties, the royal family, and wypipo in big ass hats. Especially when they think of London, ho boy; in their imagination it’s some exalted, clean (lol) city with proper and polite people in tailored clothes, fabulous accents, and yes more big ass hats. Since I am an American living in London, I can tell you that all of that is such utter horseshit that I’m laughing at my own words like Jimmy Fallon when he was on SNL. London, although I love it, is like most big cities that usually smell of piss or sewage (the plumbing is likely the original from the 19th century and is in rull need of a refurb) and instead of fancy people in fancy hats, the folks you’ll run into most often are lads (white boys from 18-35 who act like they are 17 and under) who are a few sips away from being black-out drunk, and they’re vomiting on the sidewalks even during daylight (which is a real feat considering we don’t have much of that this time of year (daylight, I mean; we have plenty of drunk ass lads)). And I never see people out in fancy hats in the city. However, one part of the stereotype rang true for me recently: I went to a fancy ass afternoon tea at a fancy ass hotel. And we liked it, and we loved it. In that beautiful dining room, surrounded by dressed up people generally behaving themselves, it felt like the London of ill-informed Americans’ dreams.
This delightful occasion arose due to a friend’s visit. I asked what she wanted to do in London and she said “go to a fancy tea!” and I said “yay!” and she said “let’s go to the Ritz like the real classic high tea!” and I said “I didn’t know they could do it vegan!” (we’re both vegan) and she said “I saw reports!” and I said “I’ll email them just to be sure!” and she said “I will too!” and the Ritz told us “we can do vegan!” and I said “Why wouldn’t you put that information on your website so vegans know that you are an option and also why wouldn’t you be publicizing the fork out of your ability to accommodate vegans when London’s dining scene is like completely controlled by and catered to vegans right now (and rightfully so)?” Okay I didn’t say that but I’m going to because they should be allll about the vegan clientele; we run this city. WHO RUN THIS CITY? Vegans. Anyway, some of you more in-the-know tea fans might have caught a mistake in my very accurate portrayal of my convo with my friend: “High tea” is not what we were after. What many people think of as ‘high tea’ is really ‘afternoon tea’, with the little finger sandwiches with no crusts (‘crusts are for the poor!’ – English people) and scones and decadent desserts. That’s afternoon tea. High tea means like, regular dinner food. It comes from when working classes, who unlike the upper class jabronies couldn’t take hours out of their afternoons to share a prissy tea service with little cakes and shit with their behatted neighbors to talk about how hard it is to find good help, would instead drink their tea together after work, and that’s when they’d need their big evening meal. That’s why so many non-Londoners call dinner “tea”, because that’s when they eat regular dinner food. (They also don’t call dinner ‘dinner’ it’s usually really tea or supper (gag) or sometimes they call lunch dinner and I’m going to just drop it before my head splodes.)
walking through The Ritz like I’m ‘portant
So, anyway, here we are, it’s afternoon tea and The Ritz, the famous classic hotel on Piccadilly, which according to wikipedia is “one of the world’s most prestigious and best-known hotels”, does it up for us vegan-style. I’ll be honest; I had low expectations. Even though they said they could do a proper tea with vegan goodies, I’ve been disappointed by super fancy expensive places before. In fact, they’re the places that most frequently disappoint with their ‘vegan accommodation’. So I was excited for this afternoon tea, but I was expecting to drag them for offering sub-par vegan fare. Well GUESS WHO’S DOING THE DRAGGING NOW. I mean, no one, that doesn’t make any sense I guess because it was AWESOME. All the food was delicious, we had scones, we had incredible cakes and what nots. Guys, if you wanna visit, I would go back with you. It was FANTASTIC. (Just so you know, the aforementioned visiting friend treated me to the experience AND brought Beyond Sausages over, I mean not that you have to meet such a high bar if you visit, no not at all, I’m just sharing so you know it’s an option for you.)
Oh also, the bathroom in the hotel was the nicest. They even had glass water bottles and glasses out in the little sitting area. I didn’t take pictures in the bathroom because I’m not a total weirdo but here are some more interior shots before we get to the food.
STRANGER DANGER
When we arrived, they took our name and led us to our table, but they apparently misheard the name because our main waiter thought we were a Birthday Table at first and not the Vegan Table. Luckily I told him before too long ‘you know we are both the vegans right we confirmed like several times right you are ready for us?’ so he was like ‘ohhh okay your name is X not what I thought I heard’ and I was like BRING ME TINY SANDWICHES and, reader, he did. It took longer to get water (fancy places and their hatred of bringing me tap water!) but hey sandwiches!
Each of the five types of vegan sandwich options were superb, which is something I never thought I’d say. Like Joey, I love sandwiches, but not like regular soft-bread sandwiches, what even are those? If we’re talking sandwiches, I’m talking loaded banh mis (banhs mi?), meatball subs, hoagies with all kinds of shit falling out of it, like legit sangwiches, with a g. Not simple sliced bread from a plastic bag at the supermarket with invisible fillings; that’s some minor league bullshit. But these little baby finger sandwiches were delicious, even without shit falling out of them like I like.
The five vegan options were:
- olive tapenade and artichoke. I mean, amazing pair. I did not expect such an awesome option, I really just expected cucumber sandwiches. So this was such a great surprise and it was made perfectly.
- tomato. I don’t really love raw tomatoes and yet this was wonderful, probably because it was salted the best amount and the tomatoes were really good. It was such a pleasant lil sang.
- the classic cucumber and margarine. Man, I didn’t know adding margarine could elevate the simplest thing to being amazing, like what on earth this had no business being so good it was cucumber and MARGARINE and yet it was perfection??
- red pepper and hummus. As you probably know I really don’t like red pepper, but hummus is my #1 food on earth, so this pairing was tearing me apart Lisa! But putting aside my personal preferences, it is a really smart pairing, and the peppers were cooked (so, soft and not crunchy/raw) and it was pretty great. (I only had one though.)
- avocado. Probably my favorite, the sandwich version of avocado toast (lolz) with the best ingredient ever (avocado) plus the second best (salt). SO GOOD.
We were unsure whether the ticket price included endless rounds of anything, but they brought us an extra layer of sandwiches even before we could ask! And then we were too full to bother asking for more/being wasteful gluttons so we called it. But I am pretty sure you can ask for more of anything you want.
me oh my i love sandwiches
Next up to bat, the scones! We were so dang excited that they had vegan scones to begin with, so we weren’t too sad that they didn’t have vegan clotted cream to go with them. Honestly, I don’t really know what clotted cream is so I’m not too distraught over not having a vegan version yet. Eating them with margarine and strawberry jam seemed great anyway. The scones were a little tough but still good. Yay scones!
We had two scones each and we were hurting. It didn’t seem like a lot of food but I guess when you are drinking all that tea you get full! Oh yeah we ordered tea, but that’s the least important aspect of A Tea. (I had a floral one? and friend had a Chinese one? who cares about the tea?)
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Okay, next came the desserts. Looking around the room, everyone else had their top tier full of macarons (the fancy French meringue-y little circle sandwich looking jawns (is that the best definition anyone has ever given), not macaroons, which are the coconut balls popular for Passover). Now, some of you might be sad at not getting macarons, but honestly, despite how gorgeous they are, they leave me cold. They require sooo much effort to make (anyone experimenting over on the Aquafaba Experiments facebook group can tell you that) and they taste like sort of sweet cardboard. And the consistency hurts my teeth and my brain, yeesh. So I was pretty fine with not getting macarons like the rest of the room. But more importantly — I think the vegan dessert options were better than the regular! So everyone else had macarons and like a boring looking tart or whatever. We had shiny little chocolate fudge concoctions that were literally among the best desserts ever. The regular menu doesn’t include chocolate anything! Vegan version for the win.
I know this is like the same image but a different size but now is the time to focus on the chocolate at the top AT THE TOP
The shiny chocolate half moon was the richest, densest fudge, and a superthick layer of it to boot. That would have been enough to send me over the moon, but inside the chocolate part was a sort of banana pudding. It was AMAZ. Seriously I don’t understand why this isn’t just on their regular menu. Nothing in that room was better than it!
Well, except maybe the banana walnut cake.
When we started onto the desserts, another waiter asked us how everything was and we were like damn, this chocolate masterpiece is a masterpiece. And HE said, ‘oh it’s fine but the banana walnut is my favorite’ and we were like ‘whoooo on earth likes a banana bread jawn more than anything chocolate, especially THIS chocolate?’ But honestly, it was probably the best banana bread/cake I’ve ever had. That guy was right. It was absolutely amazing. Okay get ready becaues I’m going to use the word everyone hates, but I have never had a cake that was as moist as this banana bread. And – confession – I didn’t eat it at the table because I got too full. I took it home and had it the next day. And it was still the moistest (sorry) and super delicious, man alive.
Then a waiter started going around the room with the dessert cart, which is full of even more options that the regular menu people could choose from. We said to each other ‘oh well, I guess that’s kind of disappointing that we can’t do the super-extra-gluttonous part of picking even more dessert from the extravagant cart, but we’re kind of full anyway’, but then the guy stopped and gave us each a piece of cake! He said this was the extra vegan addition, a pound cake sort of thing with raspberry. We so excited!
It was a little bit dry, but still good, and hey we’re not looking an extra gift cake in the mouth.
Overall, it was a wonderful experience. Even though there are several all-vegan teas being publicized around London, I would totally go back to the non-vegan Ritz – for a special occasion. And I wish I could order the chocolate and banana desserts for parties! It was so special to be able to enjoy this classic/stereotypical English experience. And now when people say ‘oh you live in London? Do you go to fancy teas all the time and eat little sandwiches?’ I’m going to tip my enormous hat and say ‘You bet your bloomin’ ass I do!’ And so can you.
the moistest cake ever is in that box HAHA I SAID IT AGAIN
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Genesis in Shoreditch: Good, Interesting, Overpriced Vegan Food
When I last lived in Philadelphia, I lived in the Rittenhouse Square area, right near the big (only?) Barnes and Noble on the corner of 18th and Walnut. Literally the day after I ended my lease, HipCityVeg, a super cool vegan ‘healthy but fun food’ joint, opened across the street from my old apartment. They had burgers, wraps, fries, shakes, all really fantastic too. (Of course their management is questionable at best but this isn’t a post about them.) So of course, of COURSE, I have to tell you that I used to live on Commercial Street, right outside Spitalfields market, right across the street from As Nature Intended, the organic shoppe. And lo, what has opened up right on that block recently? A super cool vegan ‘healthy but fun food’ joint, what else? Let me know if you’re looking to open up a similar place and I’ll tell you when I move from my current house, since I guess that’s the game the universe has chosen for me. Genesis, this newest addition to London’s vegan, organic, swanky, instagram-friendly restaurant scene, is a great addition to the neighborhood, but it’s a good thing I don’t live as close to it anymore, because it’s way too expensive.
Definitely the best decorated new place I’ve seen in a while, Genesis nails that chic fancy-casual (it’s a thing) vibe that Spitalfields and Shoreditch embrace more and more. Even the food market inside Spitalfields, once just shaky frames that would get taken down every evening, is now mainly composed of permanent counters that give the impression of easy street food but are upscale and expensive. Genesis is all cool, bright, and pink upstairs, with neon lights and fun artwork and signs advertising their choice to cook everything in avocado oil (supposedly healthier, probably more expensive). It feels like it could be an ’80s throwback, but also with ’70s New Mexico decor? It’s cute and fun. OH the only bad thing is – sometimes there is incense burning near the counter where you order, and where some diners will eat. That is like Restaurant 101, to never have strong smells competing with the food smells, especially near (or at!!) seats where it’ll interfere with people’s ability to taste the food. Did you never watch the Top Chef episode where the judges berate the team who puts scented candles on the tables? (One of three episodes I have seen.) Downstairs is dark, crowded, and feels like a late-night joint even earlier in the day (and where decent pictures are impossible). I have now eaten upstairs, downstairs, and via takeaway, so I am equipped to pass my judgment.
The menu, the giant gorgeous menu above, is probably the greatest sounding ever. I can’t remember any place I’ve ever been more excited about after looking at the menu. It is BALLER. Everything sounds amazing. Whoever created it really did a fantastic job. It’s random, with burgers and hot dogs and also laksa? and Indian food? but you get the worldly joyous feel they were going for.
Execution of the food is not as fantastic. It’s fine, don’t get me wrong, and some things are great. But nothing is so incredible that it warrants how expensive it is. Let’s take a look.
Let’s start with the apps and sides. The small plates, if you will, although most things here would fit that description. When I was there with a party of three, we ordered the nachos and the cheese sticks to start. I mean, guys, look at these portions. I could have housed both of these myself and still had room for my main. The bowl for the nachos is what most restaurants would serve a cup of soup in. Not even a bowl of soup! A cup! They were pretty good, but they needed more toppings to make it more ‘nacho’ and less ‘tortilla chips with some sprinkles’. Good, not great; small, not large. The nacho cupasoup bowl is £9.50!!! That is essentially 10 pounds for a handful of chips, a literal tablespoon of guacamole, and some peppers. I could make my own nacho trough for that price, and that’s expecting that I’d have to go through five or so avocados before finding a good one, LONDON.
But that was fine and whatever compared to the cheese sticks. Guys, do you see the cheese sticks? First of all, they were AMAZING. So delicious, so impressive – they found that right texture between solid and creamy that few purveyors of vegan mozzarella et al. cheese sticks have been able to. But that’s the full portion – three. And at least on my computer, the picture is true to actual size. They were about the size of my pinky finger, no longer or wider. And there were JUST THREE. And it cost £5.95! That’s a motherforking £2 PER PINKY. I didn’t realize how expensive they were because I didn’t pay for them but MAN ALIVE. I really liked them too.
The tacos are the best part of Genesis, I think, because even though one taco is £5 and that is ridiculous, that’s also about market rate for vegan tacos in London, at least compared with the queen of all vegan Mexican food, Club Mexicana. So fine. And the tacos here are really good. I’ve tried the smoked chorizo, with tomatillo salsa, potatoes, and pico de gallo; the fried avocado taco, with refried beans, pico de gallo, and sour cream; and the jackfruit hoisin, with jackfruit ‘duck’, hoisin mayo, cucumber and spring onion, and they were all RG. The fried avocado I’d say is my favorite, and then the jackfruit duck. Their duck piece was more solid than jackfruit usually is, which I liked. So, solid taco game, Genesis!
The next up of the small plates, maybe we’ll call them the Mindy St. Claire Medium Plates, if you will, do not fare as well. Nothing is bad, as I said above, but some things aren’t executed as well as others, especially for the price.
I’d been waiting a while to try the kamut mac & cheese, because they can’t do it to go, something about how it’s cooked in its wee pot. So we got it on our third trip, and while it was fine, it was kind of bland. And I love bland food. Also, this little ramekin is tiny. Given the trend so far, I’m sure it’s exactly what you’d expect here for £6.50, but in a regular place for that price I’d expect double the portion.
My most disappointing dish was the kale caesar salad. You know I love salad, like weirdly all the time love it and I even put regular food on top of salad often, so it’s no surprise I ordered this on my first visit. They offer two sizes for their salads, and I got the large. Or so I thought. Does this look like the large? I shudder to imagine what they serve the small size in, Dixie cups?? The perspective in the picture is a little off for comparing, but the salad bowl was about the same size as a taco, and about as deep too. The lettuce and kale were in too-big pieces, making it super awkward to eat. They definitely need to cut the leaves smaller. But at least it allows you to see how small the portion was – I mean you can count the total number of leaves in the bowl. It’s about 10. I can’t really believe that this is actually the large size, so I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt that there was a mistake and this was the small, because for £12, Ima need more than 10 leaves.
The bigger dishes are much more satisfying, both in terms of value and taste. My favorite is the sabich, mainly because you get two. It’s little Israeli pita sandwiches with aubergine, red onion, green tahini, cucumber, tomatoes, and the best little tofu egg scramble. The flavor here was wonderful and I really liked it. And for £7.95 it’s the best value in the whole place. Would recommend!
Please excuse this picture of my takeaway, but it’s the torta Milanesa. And this is another one that’s pretty decent value and a great taste! Two in a row! I really enjoyed this super hearty, flavorful Mexican sandwich. Its base is panko-dipped aubergine slices, which were a little tough to bite without taking the entire slice out of the sandwich, so I’d recommend that they cut them into smaller pieces. But with the lettuce, avocado, chipotle mayo, salsa, onions, tomato, and coconut cheese, it was a great flavor. It says there’s nopal cactus in there too which is awesome but I didn’t really notice it. Regardless, this is a great sandwich, and for £9.95 it’s a lot but decent for this restaurant.
We also tried one of the hot dogs. Honestly, the reason I recommend the hot dogs over the burgers is purely based on size. If you aren’t that hungry, then order a burger. They are tiny. They’re a little bit tall, but they are the circumference of sliders. Literally half the size of a Vurger burger (which is around the corner, and cheaper, just saying). But the hot dogs are well-sized. For about £11, they better be. This sauerkraut dog is the simplest of the hot dog offerings, but is solid. I know I’m criticizing a lot, but look at that plate, and imagine a burger about a 1/3 of the size of the hot dog (at best) all alone on that plate. It doesn’t take a lot to add something, even if it’s just a few pieces of lettuce and onion, on the side so it doesn’t look so lonely and depressing.
Genesis has a banging dessert menu, including my favorite food in the world: soft-serve. I know. It’s really delicious but much richer than the typical cheap soft serve that I love out of those magical machines. I was told that it’s a mix of cashew and coconut, which accounts for the richness, and for the cost, I guess. It’s £3.95 for this little cup, which is okay I guess for London, typical, fine. But then each topping is another POUND. Man, at least make the little sprinkle of chocolate shavings 50p or something. A whole pound for a teaspoon of powder seems extravagant. I would have loved to have tried the soft serve with the chocolate sand (as pictured) and the honeycomb together, as a server recommended, but £6 for a little baby cup would have been too much.
They also use the soft serve for their milkshakes, which are great, I must say. You know I rail on and on about how London can’t do good milkshakes because they are too thin. But Genesis does them pretty great. Although, again, for £7, jeez louise.
So given its expensive location in the gentrified-beyond-recognition area of Spitalfields, and given that it has a decent number of (actually really nice) staff, and given that they use hundo p organic ingredients, I’m sure the prices are warranted to cover costs. It’s just that they could try a little to make it not seem like you’re getting ripped off. It doesn’t cost much in terms of time or effort to throw a basic af side salad on the plate with the sadly small burger, or throw some cheap fries next to the hot dog. And would it really cost them that much more to have another cheese stick or two in that order, considering at the moment it’s three little bits the size of mini gherkins??? I’m trying really hard to give them the benefit of the doubt regarding their price points, but the more I think about it, the more ridiculous it seems. I mean THREE CHEESE STICKS. For SIX POUNDS! That is 2 pounds per little fried mini Gherkin. As someone who has eaten her fair share of overpriced food, I can say with a fair deal of certainty that there’s nothing in a 1.5 inch piece of fried (delicious) goop worth 2 whole freaking pounds.
But if you know what to order (the sabich, the torta) and what to skip (the cheese sticks, the salad! le sigh), then you can at least have great food for an okay value, at least given the area. And that way it doesn’t feel too excessive to get soft-serve too! I feel bad being so critical of this place because I really do like the food and I really really like the staff. And they have nice bathrooms! But most of the dishes are just so g-d overpriced. Given how much great vegan food is in the area, and for so much cheaper, I can’t really justify going here all that regularly. But if you are in London, you give it a try! And tell me I’m wrong! I’d love to be wrong.
New Orleans Inspirations: The Fried Bread Pudding Po’ Boy
Welcome, my little bunnies, to my post about – without a doubt – the most gluttonous, glutenous thing I will make and eat probably EVER.
We are going to have to listen to this while we work, because it’s the only sound I can think of that properly captures both how ridiculous this is and how my friend and I felt when we didn’t have to eat any more of it.
If you read my New Orleans general food guide, you know that during our epic eating week I came across this hilarious, unbelievable, obviously non-vegan gem of a food item that apparently people actually eat:
A fried bread pudding po’boy. That means people have eaten a pile of bread pudding used as sandwich filling on a French baguette. And what’s fried? Is it the bread pudding hunk that is fried into a patty then placed on the bread? Is the pudding placed on the bread as is, and then the whole baguette is fried? ARE BOTH THE PUDDING AND THE SANDWICH FRIED? Yes. Yes, is being my answer. Easy question. Let’s make this!
FRIED BREAD PUDDING PO’ BOY
PART 1 – THE BREAD PUDDING
First, we make the bread pudding. This turned out to be a delicious recipe and you should definitely make it, even if you don’t have the strength to move on to part 2. I used Ezekiel’s Cinnamon Raisin bread, which was invented for the sole purpose of using in bread pudding, but you can use any bread really. I’d add a teaspoon of cinnamon if you use regular bread, because who doesn’t want cinnamon bread pudding?
First, we make the bread pudding. This turned out to be a delicious recipe and you should definitely make it, even if you don’t have the strength to move on to part 2. I used Ezekiel’s Cinnamon Raisin bread, which was invented for the sole purpose of using in bread pudding, but you can use any bread really. I’d add a teaspoon of cinnamon if you use regular bread, because who doesn’t want cinnamon bread pudding?
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I believe this is what’s called raw food? |
LEANING TOWER OF BREADDDD 
This is what’s left of the 6 pound bag of besan I bought on Amazon 
Sugared 
Not raw food |
PART 2: THE VANILLA SAUCE
I don’t see how the restaurant’s prize-winning po’ boy would have won anything without a really good sauce.
I don’t see how the restaurant’s prize-winning po’ boy would have won anything without a really good sauce.
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Directions:
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“Hey there pudding I’m coming for you! Yayyyy!” |
Part 3: THE FRYING AND THE ASSEMBLING
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so many hand pictures 
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OBVIOUSLY, if you own a personal deep fryer, drop that entire sandwich into that bad boy. Oh man, I DARE ANY OF YOU TO DO THAT. Please tell me about it if you do and we’ll post pictures.
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Oh yes add peanut butter to it, by all means |
There you have it, America.
2 Comments
This really made me laugh! I’m a Brit, and we eat like this every day. Joking. This is as fancy for us as it was for you. I LOVE doing afternoon tea at the big London hotels, it rocks. Man aren’t the little tiny teeny sandwiches just THE BEST?! When I worked in media and got bored of the fancy meeja client lunches, I switched to afternoon tea at the Ritz or the Savoy and honestly clients loved it way more! I think it’s coz you feel just so looked after. And obvs, the piano. It’s really all about the piano and the TINY TEENY SAMMICHES. Oh and I agree with you about why the hell don’t they have the vegan menu on the site, like WHAT. Anyway, I’m hoping to go soon, when lockdown ends!
Haha thank you so much! I definitely can’t wait to go again sometime soon and eat food that I didn’t make myself! 😛