Trying out HipChips - crisps & dips for lunch!

[caption id="attachment_3556" align="alignnone" width="1200"] A conveyor belt of crisps![/caption]

We love finding quirky places to eat and HipChips is no exception. Who knew that London needed a restaurant for crisps?

This new concept opened only last month and we were delighted to try it out.

Located in Old Compton Street, in the heart of Soho, London, it’s an interesting concept – that your meal should be made up of crisps and dips. But you know what? It works. And it’s got that different kind of vibe which makes it great fun for a different way of eating out (in that way, it reminded me of the Cereal Cafe, which is also great fun for adults, teens and tweens). Mind you, Jess was supremely irritated that it was called HipChips and not Hipcrisps.

There are different options when it comes to the food. We chose a mixture of the savoury and sweet dips, a good decision as it made it a bit more like a conventional meal (we had the savouries first and then the sweet). The crisps, by the way, are made on site and from a variety of different potatoes.

You can choose your own dips, with a choice of two for £4.50, three for £6.75 and six for £11.50. Yes, I know it sounds mad to pay that kind of money for crisps and dips, but actually it’s lunch – and the six dips were enough for us, meaning it wasn’t actually that expensive for a London-based snack. And that’s disregarding the fun value.

We all particularly liked the baba ganoush (aubergine) dip, while Brian scoffed his way through nearly the entire pot of veggie ceviche (basically a kind of salsa made up of tomato, lime, coriander, onion and chilli) and we also enjoyed the katsu curry. I had a taste of the smoky cheese fondue, and the Moroccan Yoghurt also sounded good.

The salted caramel sweet dip was absolutely delicious, but the chocolate praline mousse  (nutella, praline crème fraiche) which we thought would be our favourite, was a bit too rich – even for us! Both the kids really liked the strawberry cheesecake one and polished it off, although we didn’t quite finish the crème brulee.

Robert was not a big fan of the crisps themselves, although the rest of us were very happy with them. They are a bit like “posh” crisps and not like the thicker, machine formed ones you buy in average packs (my son is not particularly one for posh food and that may be true of other younger children too). The ones for the sweet dips have a cinnamon sugar coating, but this was quite subtle.  We all enjoyed our drinks – which were the German make Fritz and a combination of apple juice, cola and lemonade. There is also wine, beer and soft drinks on offer.

[caption id="attachment_3558" align="alignnone" width="1200"] We did pretty well![/caption]

All in all we enjoyed our unusual lunch and thought it was a great place for sharing. We also think it’s good fun for kids – and were impressed by how busy it was!

Read Jess's piece on five cool places to eat in London

Read about our chocolate walking tour

The Little Veggie Pop Up (by Ella)

I'm delighted to have another guest post from my very gorgeous niece Ella, who's 16. So far, she has written on Barcelona and Whitstable. Today, she's closer to home, in London, and her mind's on food.....

"Whether you live in London, or have visited, you will know that a Pret a Manger can be found on almost every corner, especially in the centre of the city.

I thought I was perfectly happy with occasionally popping into Pret for a packet of popcorn and a hot chocolate. That is, until I discovered the Little Veggie Pop Up. As a vegetarian, I sometimes feel limited in restaurant and food choices - in particular when grabbing a sandwich or a quick bite - but Pret's Little Veggie Pop Up may turn out to be the answer I didn't even realise I was looking for.

Located in the heart of Soho, the cafe offers a wide range of vegetarian and vegan foods for all meals of the day. As you approach, you are instantly attracted to the bright green exterior which advertises the healthy aspects of the cafe as well as highlighting its vegetarian and vegan offerings.

Then, as you enter, you are greeted with the typical Pret interior - the cash point, dozens of delicious looking home baked goods in front of you and the fridges to the left. But in this Pret, there is a difference.

Instead of the typical ham sandwiches, egg sandwiches and just about every other sandwich filling you can think of, you find an assortment of extremely healthy and intriguing vegetarian and vegan foods, alongside ready to blend smoothies. My friend enjoyed an Asian Tofu Salad and I was tempted by an intriguing sounding vegan artichoke, tapenade  and olive baguette.

The atmosphere was busy and lively - no different to a regular Pret - and the customers ranged in age, as well as being both Londoners and tourists.

In the end, I went for a mushroom and avocado sushi salad (£4.20), along with a pot of edamame beans and a spicy chickpea yoghurt bowl (which I took home and put in the fridge, only to later find my meat-adoring mum had already devoured it!). The sushi salad was absolutely perfect - the combination of mushroom and avocado may not sound like a dream come true, but it somehow works, and the flavours complemented one another really well. Each item I bought was appropriately priced and sized, leaving me with no complaints.

So, if you are in the mood for something light, healthy and enjoyable then Pret's Little Veggie Pop Up is the place for you. I preferred it to normal Prets, but you have to enjoy vegetarian food to do so - the quality of food isn't necessarily better, but is no less.

The Little Veggie Pop (on Broadwick Street, London W1) was originally planned to be open just for the month of June, but due to its popularity it will remain open for the entire summer. I'll be going back again soon."

MORE ON FOOD!

5 Cool places to eat in London

Vegfest - enjoying vegan food.....

Visiting VegFest London: Scrumptious Vegan Food

Jess writes: Last year, mum, dad, and Robert visited London VegFest, a vegan event in Olympia with loads of different vegan companies selling and giving out tasters of their products. Naturally, after reading the post that mum wrote about it and seeing the bags and bags of delicious vegan food that they brought back, I knew that I wanted to go.

Our family has a strange relationship with food. While mum, dad, and I love cheese, butter, and soya sauce, my brother Robert is allergic to dairy, soya, and eggs. This means that our house is full of vegan cookbooks, and we often have trouble trying to find places to eat when we are out on public. Therefore, VegFest is like heaven to Robert - it is the one place in London where he can eat almost everything, and there is a lot to eat!

 

[caption id="attachment_1866" align="alignnone" width="1200"] There was lots of delicious chocolate on offer, and we had loads of tasters![/caption]

VegFest takes part in different venues across the UK, with Scotland next to host in December this year. It is held over two floors in Olympia London, and is absolutely massive. There are companies selling things from vegan steaks to delicious chocolate, and we absolutely gorged ourselves on tasters of vegan chocolate, cupcakes, sausages, cheesecakes and puddings. Even though we eat meat and I definitely do not want to go vegan, the fact that the products didn't contain dairy, meat, or eggs didn't faze me - it was all delicious and a lot of things were free.

[caption id="attachment_1865" align="alignnone" width="1200"] Robert loved his bars from Moo Free - they tasted like real milk chocolate![/caption]

As soon as we stepped out of the lift, we were greeted with the stall from Moo Free Chocolates. Moo Free makes vegan, gluten free, wheat free, and soya free chocolates that taste exactly like milk chocolate. Many products were soya free and gluten free at VegFest.  After taking a lot (and I mean a lot) of tasters, we ended up buying enough chocolate to fill up half of a paper bag - quite an impressive feat when you consider the fact that they were only intended for one person...

[caption id="attachment_1867" align="alignnone" width="1200"] Scrumptious bubble tea from Nosteagia![/caption]

My favourite stall in the entire festival was Nosteagia, incredible bubble tea based in Shoreditch. I tried peach and green tea flavour and Robert had blackcurrant, and both were utterly delicious. We had lychee flavoured balls inside called "poppings", and they explode on your tongue when you bit into them. I'm going to have to go to their stall in East London with my friends now!

[caption id="attachment_1869" align="alignnone" width="1200"] The vegan pizza from the Venice Bakery tasted like the real thing[/caption]

Although there were loads of delicious cakes and puddings (such as a cookie from Ms Cupcake and puddings from Pudology), there was also loads of savoury food to try. We bought pizza slices from the Venice Bakery, tried delectable falafel and spicy bites from Great Food and Robert had a spring roll from Loving Hut.

[caption id="attachment_1871" align="alignnone" width="1200"] We loved the massive, delectable cookies from Ms Cupcake[/caption]

We also loved the chocolate and strawberry milk from Koko, salted caramel ice cream from The Nude Spoon, pecan ice cream from Jollyum, peanut butter cups from eat chic, and rose lemonade and cherry cola from Fentimans. However, a particular highlight of the day was the different scented candles from Harper's Bizarre Candles. We ended up buying four: Jaffa Cake, Black Vanilla, Pear Drops, and Fresh Air. Everything smelt incredible, and there were some funny names (I Love You But You Smell was a particular favourite of ours).

[caption id="attachment_1872" align="alignnone" width="1200"] The candles from Harper's Candles smelt amazing[/caption]

Aside from the scrumptious food, there were lots of other types of stalls at VegFest. There were ethically made shoes, essential oils, lots of make up, very soft bamboo pillows and some petitions to sign.

There were some demonstrations, debates, and talks to go and see, and we ended up going to a demonstration of how to make vegan sweets. However, it was really busy and noisy, and you couldn't hear much of what she was saying. It seemed as though most people were just there to get a seat. Mum and dad say that it was much busier than last year.

Apart from the queues, I had a really great time at VegFest. We left with full stomachs and bags full of goodies, and had a really nice time. There was a lot to do, and we spent about three hours walking around. I definitely recommend visiting next year!

Tickets to VegFest are £10 for adults and £6 for concessions in advance, and £12 and £8 on the door. Kids under 16 are free. There was a long queue of people waiting outside, so we recommend getting there early. There was a section for smaller children and a place for teenagers, but we didn't go to either of these. If you are bringing young children, be aware that it was very busy. 

 

VegFestUK - trying some delicious vegan food!

As some of you may know, Robert has some food allergies - egg, dairy and soya - which make eating out a bit tricky.  That's why we were so excited to hear about VegFest UK, which is a huge vegan and veggie festival, with masses of stalls, cookery demonstrations and talks, plus comedy and other performances.

Intrigued by this, Brian, Robert and I went off to Olympia in London a few weeks ago to see what was on offer. To say that we were impressed would be an understatement. There was just so much to find out about as well as so much to eat - and most of it was delicious. Even Jess, who is particularly fond of food containing butter, cream and eggs (!) wants to come next time.

VegFest takes part in different venues across the UK, with Brighton and Bristol next to host, in March and May next year. It was was full of stalls, which included some clothing and toiletries amongst all the food. We, however, were most interested in what we could eat (although we did like the soaps on offer at the soap deli which not only smelt delicious but were, we were assured, very good for delicate or eczema prone skin).

It's true that some of the stalls offered wares which used soya, but there were loads that didn't. Everyone was extremely friendly and there were masses of samples, which of course we had to try. We were particularly taken with the cakes and chocolates we tried, but also impressed to find a vegan pesto sauce (made by Conserve della nonna) which was delicious (unlike others we have sampled in the past).

[caption id="attachment_725" align="aligncenter" width="940"] Enjoying a cookie[/caption]

Robert was very happy to try a huge cookie from Ms Cupcake, and to get stuck into the new flavour samples from Moo Free, which has become one of his favourite chocolate makes. This is because they knew they wanted to be kid friendly - and made their chocolate taste as near to milk, as opposed to dark, chocolate as possible. This is truly clever, as most the chocolate we've tried has been dark and Robert isn't a huge fan (not sweet enough!). We also liked the new chocolate buttoms from Ombar and ate rather too many of the fabulous Goody Good stuff sweets.

There was so much to see and eat, including some amazing raw juices (particularly from noshraw), delicious coconut milk (Koko was the best!) and yummy desserts from pudology (only one is currently soya free, but they're working on it!). Lots of the produce was also gluten-free.

Although they do contain soya, Brian and I were wowed by Claire Baker's Consider It Chocolates (any vegans out there, we implore you to try them) which were amazing, especially the cinnamon ones. We were also astonished by the array of massive doughnuts and cream buns from the Big Fat Vegan Bakery, although we were too full to try them! We did give the flaxseed milk a go, but, although it's probably good for you, it wasn't the best we've ever tasted (ugh!), while the vegan "duck" was nothing special.

Everyone we met was extremely friendly and chatty. There was even a kids' zone where a pirate taught the children to flip pancakes (yes, really) and Robert powered up a blender simply by riding a bike!

[caption id="attachment_726" align="aligncenter" width="940"] Powering a blender through cycling![/caption]

All in all, we had a lovely time and it was great to be in a place where Robert felt he could enjoy himself and eat like a "normal" child (!) rather than finding nothing tempting on offer. His ticket was free and adult tickets were only £10 in advance (and there are various other offers including buy one get one free).

We will be back again and think that anyone interested in food would enjoy the array of goodies on offer. Now we just have to decide whether to go to Bristol or Brighton!

Read more:

Robert's view on Cadburyworld

This week we've linked up with the Mad Mid Week Blog Hop, hosted by the lovely Super Busy Mum. Hope over there to see more blog posts...