Terre a Terre - Brighton

On our second night in Brighton we had dinner at Terre a Terre, voted the best for Vegetarian UK in the Observer, 2008. The restaurant definitely deserves the high praise. The menu is extremely creative, especially the written descriptions, and very well priced. When we arrived for our reservations at 7:30 the place was already in full swing and it showed very little sign of dying down by the time we left around 10. This restaurant is no secret at all but the quality is still very high.

My choices:
Smoked Sakuri soba (₤7.95) - loved this dish, especially the miso and white wine dressing. The pomegranate seeds were a nice touch as well.
Asta la pasta (₤14.65) - loved the broad beans and the wine thyme shallots. The pasta in this dish and the soba noodles in my starter were both wound into extremely tight little mounds which I found impressive.



Eddie's choices:
Soup of the day (₤5.90) - Caramelized shallot with peas and broad beans. Served in an absolutely massive bowl with a huge chunk of garlic foccacia bread.
Indi house (₤13.95) - Eddie thought this dish was good but had way too many onions.

To share:
Rain Vodka Cherry Chocolate Churros (₤7.70) - Three large doughnut sticks that were very nice. Cherrys in vodka had a little too much vodka.

Total cost for food, drinks and service: ₤75

All our food was extremely good but we both felt that the portion sizes were too big, especially the starters. Both starters we ordered could have been meals in themselves. Next time we visit we will know to maybe share a starter rather than each getting our own!

Service during our meal was very friendly and helpful, although very slow at times, which our waitress always apologized for. It was good though to have some time between courses to allow the massive portions to settle!

As the night wore on the restaurant got really hot. The place was entirely full the almost three hours we were there and while they had fans running it really was a little unbearable. I made the mistake of going to the even hotter bathrooms in the basement of the restaurant where the kitchen apparently is. Speaking of the bathrooms they need some serious TLC. They don't match the smart, sleek decor of the restaurant at all and were quite disheveled when I used them.

So, as a comparison to Food for Friends we found that Terre a Terre wasn't as intimate as Food for Friends. Both restaurants had very appealing menus with a ton of choices. They both offer great value for money with Terre a Terre serving massive portions of food and Food for Friends serving massive portions for drinks. Both restaurants were definitely some of the best we have been to in the UK and we plan on returning to both of them.