After chatting about this, we decided to create an offshoot/extra curricular type DC where we would investigate only vegetarian restaurants. Since then, we've eaten at five - only one of which we combined with an official DC visit.
Tonight we visited our fifth - Vanilla Black in Took's Court near Chancery Lane.
It was raining heavily when we arrived at 5.45, huddled under our umbrellas with one of our party, Alex, soaked to the bone since he doesn't wear a coat or use an umbrella (long story). We had booked a table for 6pm and couldn't wait to get into a warm, dry restaurant for a nice glass of vino. Imagine our surprise then, when the manager opened the door for a girl in front of us, presumably a waitress arriving for work, and refused to let us in behind her.
"Have you booked a table?"
Yes, at 6.
"Sorry but we don't open until 6"
Can't you let us in so we can wait on the sofa in the window?
"No I'm sorry, we need to get changed, I'm not dressed yet and we can't let you in until we're ready."
Okaaay.
And we were back in the rain. Great.
If you know the backstreets of Chancery Lane at all, you'll know it's not exactly filled with places to pop into for a quick pint. And it was raining. Brrr.
Looking around quickly/desperately we saw a sign saying The Blue Anchor. Looks like a pub, we thought, but with stairs that disappeared to somewhere that looked rather too upmarket for a pub, we just decided to huddle in the doorway and wait for 15 minutes. The damage was done and a big black mark appeared in all our minds.
At 6 on the dot we tried again and were welcomed like we had never been seen before. Sitting down, relieved to be dry, we decided against wine as we weren't exactly in the mood anymore, so a jug of tap water it was.
The menu was complicated - a little pretentious sounding if anything - and we had to ask the waitress to decipher most of it: Ribblesdale pudding, mushroom duxelle, deconstructed carrot cake.
We went for the Ribblesdale pudding with poached duck's egg, the mushroom duxelle (only finding out once ordered that it takes 20 mins to prepare) and the leek flan. Bread options were poppy seed or hazelnut, nothing special there, but the butters on offer were a nice change - individual portions of sea salt and black pepper butter, served on a small slate.
Possibly due to the rain incident, or perhaps just as an excuse to look experimental, without warning we were suddenly presented with 3 shot glasses of pale green liquid and small white squares of jelly.
"This is horseradish turkish delight and mint and cucumber shots".
What?
Gamely I tucked in first. I love horseradish but the texture accompanying the taste was very strange. Along with the shot it had a taste effect similar to wasabi. Not the most wonderful food experience I must admit and the others agreed.
When the mains arrived it was minimalist in presentation, which wasn't totally unexpected, and the food was tasty if a little strange. It was agreed that the mushroom duxelle was probably the nicest and Alex was flummoxed by what turned out to be boulangere potatoes on his plate.
The food was perfectly nice but it was all quite clinical. Not delicious or extremely flavoursome, just 'meh'.
On to dessert.
We went for the deconstructed carrot cake, peanut butter chocolate parfait and chocolate truffle. The parfait was our fave so that disappeared first, then the carrot cake which was small squares of cake with frosting, carrot ice cream and carrot puree. Not bad. The truffle was far too rich but ok.
And that was it. As evenings go it was nice to do our catching up about Emma's new job and making our own entertainment as usual, this time laughing at Alex's random referencing of 90s tv puppet characters (Otis the aardvark in case you're wondering!), but the venue certainly did nothing to enhance our fun.
So the verdict on Vanilla Black: it wasn't that there was anything wrong exactly, but there was nothing right either. Plus they turned us away into the pouring rain! Mistake. It was also expensive - £81 for three of us eating only two courses and drinking tap water (£27 each). We've had better and paid less.
On the plus side, over tonight's meal we decided we must revisit the other four vegetarian restaurants we've found because there were excellent parts of each and we need to determine a winner.
So in the coming months we're going to re-experience Mildred's in Soho for their fab desserts, Rootmaster in Brick Lane for their delish mains, Carnevale by Old Street to give it another chance to shine and Zilli Green on Dean Street for my personal fave, their amazing passion fruit brulee.
Can't wait.
