The Larder opens at last
Some time ago on this site I bewailed the loss of the Wild Cherry Café in Globe Road, right around the corner from the Common Knowledge office. The Larder has finally opened in it’s place – a vegetarian café and deli which Zainab and I went to for lunch today.
The place looks nice and it’s relaxed. It does coffee and cakes a lot and clearly expects to have an elevenses crowd. The lunch menu was limited but careful. It didn’t have the feel of comfortable everyday vegetarianism (the proprietor has another restaurant for omnivores in Woodford)… but it was trying very hard. The Buddhist temple next door is their landlord and no meat is a condition of their lease.
I had a crepe with a broad-bean and tomato curry filling with a quinoa, mint, apple salad with roast cashews and cranberries (£6.45) and Zainab had fried tofu satay, peanut sauce, ground peanuts with roasted squash, chickpea, baby spinach, feta and pomegranate salad (£6.45)
The salads were wonderful. They had so many taste firing away on the senses that we both wished the meal had consisted just of that, although the crepe and the tofu were nice enough if a little lack-lustre. We asked if next time we could just have salads.. oh yes, we do that, they said. Wasn’t on the board though.
The deli part is quite an eclectic mix of things at posh deli prices but fans of Friends Foods, the old Buddhist business it partly compensates for, won’t be that shocked. Their bread looked good. They had some fresh stuff like organic butter and lots of jars of jam and bottles of apple juice.
We liked the general vibe. The settee and mushroom stools. The breakfast bar. The tabled area. They’ve kept the garden and even have some funky metal benches out the front (until the Borough make them move them). Let’s hope they find their feet and thrive.
Apr 17th 2011
…it sounds good!
I’m going to try this very soon, thanks John and Zainab!