London has some wonderfully eccentric veggy locations!
The Bonnington Café is one of the best.
Perhaps schedule a visit the next time that you are in London!
Time Out Cheap Eats in London Guide 2007 says –
Located just off the suitably bohemian environs of Bonnington Square, this vegetarian restaurant – decked out with endearingly mismatched chairs and tables, and dripping candles in the evening – is community-run, and uncommonly friendly as a result. Local chefs take their turns at the helm each night, so the cuisine – and therefore rather inevitably the standard – varies wildly.
Jay Rayner of the Guardian writing about The Bonnington Café –
“The atmosphere at the Bonnington Cafe, Britain’s most laid-back restaurant, is a great anachronism.”
Longer excerpt from the Jay Rayner “Review” –
What I can’t take issue with – what no reasonable person could find fault with – is the Bonnington Cafe itself. It is a complete anachronism and all the more wonderful for that. It began back in the 1970s as a communal kitchen serving the squats that made up the local neighbourhood in Vauxhall Grove, a pretty street of Victorian red bricks hard by Vauxhall Bridge. ‘In those days the houses were in a very bad state and did not have cooking facilities,’ says Margarete Baur, the longest standing member of the community group which runs it. ‘But one by one the houses were done up, they acquired kitchens and the cafe had to find a new way.’
At first it was a very ad hoc affair. Someone said they would cook for an evening, and the locals were invited to pop in for dinner if they didn’t fancy cooking for themselves. Eventually it resulted in the situation today where a rota of cooks each take a different night, paying a rental to cover upkeep of the cafe and holding on to whatever cash they make. Aspiring cooks can join the rota at the monthly meeting by agreeing to work with one of the other members to prove they know what they’re doing. ‘It’s pretty easy to see who’s up to it and who isn’t,’ Margarete says. ‘Actually there’s a waiting list.’
Read it in full here – http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2007/may/27/escape.travelfoodanddrink
Bonnington Café
| 11 Vauxhall Grove Vauxhall London SW8 1TD OPENING TIMES 7 days a week – 12pm to 2pm and 6.30pm to 10.30pm Website: www.bonningtoncafe.co.uk |
It is one of my all-time favorite places.
It is one of a very few cafe’s in the world which is “telephone free”.
Chia (328 comments)
Seems like London and England is home to an array interesting vegetarian restaurants. Seems like the people there are very open to eating veggie food.
Reading about the Bonnington Cafe reminds of a cafe in Denmark’s Christiana alternative community – there’s a veggie cafe that is also community-based and features a different cook each night or week.
webmaster (15 comments)
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