Eight years ago, I made a big change in my life. I became vegan.
It wasn’t an overnight change. I was vegetarian in my early 20s and had gone back to not eating meat about nine months before giving up all animal products. It just felt like something I needed to do, so I did it and have never looked back.
Veganism, or living a plant-based lifestyle, is not something I push on anyone. If you ask, I’ll tell you what I think. If you offer me meat or cheese or ice cream, I will politely decline.
I believe that if more people were vegan, the environment would be better off and animals would be treated with more compassion. But I also know you can’t influence the way someone thinks by shoving your beliefs down their throat.
So, with that in mind, this is not my effort to convert anyone to veganism. You do you. I’ll do me.
What I am very happy to do, however, is try to convince you to eat at a really good vegan restaurant.
Vegan Food Has Come a Long Way
One of the things I’ve appreciated most over the past eight years is just how much vegan food has changed.
When I first became vegan, eating out could still feel a little limiting. Sometimes the vegan option was clearly an afterthought. Other times, it involved removing several ingredients from an existing dish and being left with something that technically qualified as dinner.
I remember being at the airport in Portland, Oregon, absolutely starving, and going into a place I knew probably wouldn’t have many vegan options. I figured I could at least get a salad. You know, something that should be inherently vegan.
Nope.
The only salad available came with cheese and egg, so I ended up being that person and asking them to leave both off. I also had to skip the dressing, which left me with a rather sad bowl of vegetables.
That is certainly not always the case anymore.
Some of the best meals I’ve eaten in recent years have been completely plant-based. I’m not sitting there thinking about what has been substituted or wishing there were meat or cheese on my plate. I’m just eating really good food.
I’ve had vegan sushi that has ruined most other vegan sushi for me, fish and chips by the seaside, Mexican-inspired tacos I regularly crave, and meals that have felt every bit as special as anything you would expect from a fine-dining restaurant.
And that is really the point. Vegan food does not have to feel like a compromise.
Why I Started Sharing Vegan Restaurant Recommendations
Not too long ago, I added a section to this website for vegan and plant-based restaurant recommendations.
I know this is a humble little site, but a woman can try, can’t she?
The idea came partly from the fact that I was already recommending places to friends. If someone asked where they should eat in London, Brighton or somewhere I had travelled, I usually had at least one vegan restaurant ready to suggest.
Unfortunately, I’ve also watched a lot of good vegan places disappear over the past few years. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve thought about going back to a place only to find out it’s permanently closed.
That is frustrating, especially when it is somewhere doing something genuinely interesting.
So I decided I wanted to do my small part to raise up the vegan and vegan-friendly places I enjoy and hopefully send a few more people through their doors.
The Places I Keep Recommending
The recommendations are not meant to be a definitive guide to every vegan restaurant in London, the UK or beyond. They are places I have actually visited, enjoyed and would happily recommend to someone else.
Some have become favourites because they do one particular thing exceptionally well.
123V, for example, is responsible for some of the best vegan sushi I’ve eaten. Their sushi is so good that it has made eating it elsewhere considerably more difficult.
Then there is Club Mexicana, which scratches a very specific itch for me. Having grown up in the desert Southwest of the United States, Mexican food is something I miss, and their tacos have become one of my favourite ways to satisfy that craving.
If you happen to be in Brighton, The No Catch Co. proves that becoming vegan does not mean giving up the traditional seaside experience of fish and chips. You may still have to defend your lunch from the gulls, though.
And places such as Mildreds, Mallow and Studio Gauthier show just how broad the term vegan restaurant can be. Sometimes you want comfort food. Sometimes you want something a little more adventurous. Sometimes you want to sit down somewhere lovely and make a meal feel like an occasion.
There is room for all of it.
You Don’t Have to Be Vegan
You don’t need to be vegan to eat vegan food.
That sounds ridiculously obvious when written down, but I still think it is worth saying.
A good restaurant should be able to stand on the quality of its food, whether everything on the menu is plant-based or not. You do not need to have made the same choices I have to enjoy a plate of excellent food.
That is one of the reasons I want these recommendations to be useful to more than just people who are vegan.
Maybe you are trying to eat less meat. Maybe someone you are travelling with is vegan. Maybe you are curious about plant-based food. Or maybe you simply want somewhere good to eat.
All of those are perfectly good reasons to try one of these places.
A Growing List
The vegan and plant-based restaurant section is still very much a work in progress. I’m trying to add more places as I visit them, both in London and elsewhere.
A lot of readers of this blog are in the United States, so recommendations for restaurants in London, the UK and Europe may not immediately seem useful. But people travel, and having a list of good places to eat when you arrive in an unfamiliar city is always helpful.
I know I appreciate finding those kinds of recommendations when I’m planning a trip.
So consider this my growing list of places I think are worth your time — whether you’ve been vegan for years, are simply curious about plant-based food or just want a really good meal.
