Monday, March 19, 2012

Another London trip filled with food

I posted about Pret a Manger in my last London post but I ended up here again a couple times. The superfoods salad is always there and labelled vegan! Since there are Prets nearly on every street, it's handy to know you can eat something there.
I couldn't not go back to The Whole Foods Market on Kensington High street. I got lots of tasty treats. Slices of cake from Sprial veggie restaurant in Camden and MARSHMALLOWS!,
This was peanut butter cream tart. So yum!
And Carrot Cake. This was hands down some of the best carrot cake I've ever had. Tastes so good even without the cream cheese. I have been a bit weary about silken tofu, but it tastes great!
All the different flavour marshmallows available! Vanilla, Chocolate, Strawberry, Banana. I got Vanilla and Chocolate and of course they tasted great.
All the fancy vegan chocolates.

I finally came across a orange Fry's bar. I can never find them in Dublin.

Now, who would associate food poisoning with a vegetarian restaurant...? My Mum and I ate here, My Village Cafe in Camden. It's a falafel type restaurant. It was extremely tasty and they did amazing fresh juices. I got the falafel plate. And my Mum got the same but with yoghurt and Halloumi. Bad mistake. My Mum woke up that night at around 2.30am very the worst food poisoning. She was so sick. It was non stop until about 11am. And it's not possible it was from anywhere else. As we had breakfast very early and only had a banana and some carrots and hummus in the afternoon.


Breakfast in Giraffe Cafe on Kensington High Street. And they had a veggie breakfast and it was great! There was vegi sausages, Baked Mushrooms, Avocado, beans and toast.
Mildred s Vegetarian Restaurant. This was a good experience. It was good to be in proper sort of restaurant that served vegetarian and vegan food. I would recommend Mildreds. It's very central in Soho, just around the corner from Carnaby Street and Oxford Street.

I got the Vegi Burger and Sweet Potato Chips. This was AMAZING. It was the best burger I've ever had. I didn't want it to end.


And rhubard and apple crumble with vegan custard for dessert. It was really really good too. I was stuffed after the burger but when vegan desserts are available, you can't say no.




Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Vegan..Cosmetics

Cosmetics have almost been harder for when since turning Vegan. Trying to find and suitable vegan products.

I'm going to share what I've tried and what I use!

So the first obvious choice is Lush Cosmetics. I went straight to Lush once I turned Vegan to get some new haircare. And then for Christmas, I received a lot of different products.

Lush Haircare

Daddy-O Shampoo.

This is an all time favourite of mine. It is for blonde hair in particular to stop blondes going brassy. It is a purple shampoo that smells exactly like those purple parma violet sweets. It smells unreal and makes the shower water turn purple. Most importantly, it gives your hair a good cleanse and brings out the blonde in your hair. What I love about it most is how shiny it makes my hair. People always say how shiny it is after I use it.

Veganese Conditioner
I have only bought this once. I have very dry hair and I need a conditioner that really moisturizes my hair. Unfortunately Veganese didn't do the job. So I would recommend it for someone with greasier hair maybe. It's a shame though cause name has VEGAN in it.

Lush skincare and shower care

Angels on Bare Skin Cleanser
I was pretty disappointed with this. Left my skin feeling pretty grubby. Plus I'm not the biggest fan of lavender!

Eau Roma Water Toner
This is just a simple toner that I use after I take make up off. It feels great and I just spray some on to cotton wool. You get a lot in the bottle.

Happy Hippy Shower gel
I love this a lot! It smells lovely and is great in the morning. It's full of grapefruit and feels really fresh.

Sweet Pie Shower Jelly

This is hands down the best smelling thing ever. It smells like blackcurrant and I could smell the tub all day long. The jelly itself is a bit awkward to use and it slips everywhere. BUT if you use a shower glove it stays in place. Using this in the shower makes everything smell UNREAL!

Simple skin care.

There has always been Simple products in my bathroom. I always knew they didn't test on animals but I found out that the majority of their products are Vegan. From what I've seen, the majority of the haircare has honey in it.

I use the cream cleanser, which I can't fault.
Kind To Skin Purifying Cleansing Lotion
I always use some of the exfoliaters and other cleansers/washes. I have very dry sensitive skin and I still react badly to the products.



I have just discovered this range in boots after a friend mentioned it. They are a company that use 97% natural ingreidents, don't test on animals and prettty much all of their products are vegan. The vegan products are marked! The great thing is also, is that the products are reasonably priced. I find Lush products to be pretty pricey. At the moment, they are doing buy one get one free in Boots too!

So I decided to try 2 conditioners! I like my Lush Daddy O shampoo and I have a whole bottle still to use.

Naked Rescue Intensive Care Conditioner – frizzy, damaged hair

Naked Rescue Intensive Care Conditioner  – frizzy, damaged hair
I have only used this conditioner so far and I love it! It gave me all the moister I needed from a conditioner. It leaves my hair feeling soft and clean.

I also bought:

Naked Colour Protecting Conditioner – chemically coloured hair

Naked Colour Protecting Conditioner  – chemically coloured hair

They have haircare for every type of hair!



Sunday, March 4, 2012

Raspberry chocolate bars and Vegan findings at Howth market.


I had another crack at the vegan baking books I have. I haven't had much luck making cupcakes so far. I decided to go for something no cakey. So I decided to make Vegan chocolate raspberry bars from 'Sweet Vegan'. The recipe involves a coconutty mixture, chocolate, oats and raspberry jam. Delicious combination!
They came out so good as well. I devoured nearly all of it! I'll post up the recipe next time.





Howth Market

Instead of heading to the market in Dun laoghaire, like we do nearly every Sunday. We decided to head out to the Sunday market in Howth and make a day of it. So we headed off on the DART to howth. It was a lovely day as well but freezing. There's 2 sections of the market. The main one is across from road from the seafront area and then there's a small section just beside the dart station. We headed to the main one first. All that was there vegan wise really was falafel. So, I had a falafel wrap..was okay. I really wanted a soya lattee but off all the 3 cafes I checked, none of them had soya milk :(. Unfriendly Vegan howth.

After we headed off for a walk and came back we checked out the other part of the market. There was a vegetarian and vegan Indian food stand! Wish I had seen it before but even better they had Vegan and Vegi cakes! I was so excited. They said they usually had more but because it was late in the day, most had been bought already.
What they had left that was vegan was a slice of chocolate cake and date and walnut muffins. They had a 3 for fiver deal so I was sold! I slice of cake and 2 muffins. They didn't last very long though haha.
I never got the name of the stand either. I've tried to google it but had no luck. The cake and the muffins both tasted lovely anyway! I was over the moon with this find.