These are sad times for vegan restaurateurs, apparently. Turns out there is not the clamour for a 3D-printed steak or tofish and chips that once existed. Google searches for the word vegan have fallen since 2020, previously popular spots such as Halo Burger and the Glasvegan have closed.
Beyond Meat sales are down too, perhaps because those craving a burger don’t wish to journey beyond. Meat’s pretty much the final destination. The cherry on the vegan carrot cake was Eleven Madison Park in New York, the only plant-based three-Michelin-star restaurant, which returned meat to its menu this autumn. “So good to hear climate change and animal ethics have been solved and we can focus on the most important moral issue: maximising profit,” wrote one diner on Instagram, which perhaps explained the decision. People in kitchens work long hours. It helps if the clientele aren’t insufferable.
Still, it’s sad to lose the variety, and the jobs. We’ve come a long way since Gordon Ramsay declared he was allergic to vegetarians, even if the idea of simply imitating meat dishes has always seemed strange. We had a porcini mushroom omelette with pappanozza the other night. Completely veggie and not pretending to be anything it’s not. Although, reading that back, we sound pretty insufferable too.
Beef perfection
Anyway, we were at Meatopia on Saturday. (Come on, you didn’t think we were actually vegetarians, did you?) It’s been going 12 years, but this was our first time. A giant festival of meat — real meat, not 3D — in east London. Everyone who is anyone and cooks over flame is there, so that includes our lad, Will. “32-day aged beef, bone marrow and hogget crepinette, grilled spring onion and scotch bonnet salsa, shoestring fries.” He tested it in our kitchen. Bloody lovely, although obviously I’m biased. He sold 400 in less than three hours, mind, so I’m not the worst judge.
And gee whiz, the crowds. It’s 50 quid a ticket, three days, sells out in a click of the fingers, queues round the block. And that includes, well, nothing. You buy tokens for the actual grub, £7.50 a pop, beverages extra. It’s fabulous, though. You could smell the smoke from Tower Bridge.
There was a stall doing jerk ribs. They took the meat off to be served with chimichurri and handed the bones to the patient folk waiting. You’d see people walking around gnawing ribs of beef like Fred Flinstone.
But it’s not all meat. You can put a tuna patty or scallop in its shell on the grill, too. And there was ice cream. It all managed to be down and dirty, yet rather cheffy and highfalutin at the same time, as the best barbecues should be. And no lectures on ethics and climate change, although there was a bloke in a T-shirt with the message “100% Vegan” but we feel he appreciated irony, even more than salad.
Lost suppers
It appears we’ve lost A Travessa, so that’s another of the good ones gone. A friend is going to Lisbon this weekend, which is now a city in mourning, so we tried to add cheer by recommending our favourite place. Next to a puppet museum in an old convent. Get a table outside and you can watch the locals going about their business in the flats surrounding the courtyard. Clotheslines, washing, old blokes watching football on the telly in vests. Turns out it shut last year.
We’ve seen quite a few go in recent years. Our favourite restaurant in Paris was La Cerisaie in Montparnasse, near the station. Not saying it was salubrious. It was a horrible, dirty street. And it was small. The seating plan was like one of those wooden block puzzle games. One table of four meant there could only be a three in that corner, two twos and the four couldn’t leave.
But the food. From France’s southwest and a game selection second to none. Didn’t emerge from the second Covid lockdown, sadly. And, yes, I know, favourite restaurants in Lisbon, favourite restaurants in Paris, how middle class are we? But we also used to have one in Newcastle: 21 Queen Street, even won a Michelin star. We shut that one too.
