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222 veggie vegan in london: not worth the wait
8March 28th, 2009london, more restaurants (not LA)222 veggie vegan is a 100% vegan restaurant in west kensington, a rather nice area of london. they offer a daily lunchtime all-you-can-eat buffet for just £7.50, and an a la carte dinner menu every evening. i’ve never been to the lunch buffet, but have been in the past a couple of times for dinner and have overall been pretty pleased with the place. our last visit, however, left a lot to be desired.
we hit up 222 veggie vegan on a monday evening at around 6pm, and although the place wasn’t that busy, it took us forever to be noticed by the waitress. the entire place was being taken care of by just one server, and she seemed pretty flustered and miserable. when we finally got her attention, we ordered everything at once. an appetizer, two main dishes, and one side dish.
bean and tofu pancake: black eye bean and tofu pate wrapped in a wholemeal pancake, topped with tomato chunks and vegan cream sauce.
the appetizer arrived almost immediately and was definitely the highlight of the meal. the bean and tofu pancake didn’t taste like a pancake at all, more like rolled up and fried tofu scramble with a delicious sauce and a vegan sour-cream-type condiment. it was really beautifully presented and tasted great; we thought we were in for an awesome meal.
our main dishes were extremely simple, just a rice stir-fry and a salad…yet they took forever to arrive. after finishing our appetizer (which was much more intricate and came out in 5 minutes), we waited AN HOUR AND 15 MINUTES before being served the rest of our meal. throughout that time, we asked the waitress when our food would be ready and she always assured us, “oh, it will be right up.” we even saw people who had arrived thirty minutes after us being served before us. talk about a poorly managed kitchen!
ben's special: west indian stir-fry with whole-grain basmati rice and a creation of fresh vegetables, with tofu cubes or seitan (according to your choice) sauteed in extra virgin olive oil, marinated and lightly spiced.
when our food did arrive, it was decent. i ordered ben’s special with seitan and it was simple, yet tasty. the vegetables were well cooked and the seitan was thick and hearty. my only criticism would be that it was maybe a bit bland and i was underwhelmed after waiting nearly an hour and a half to eat it.
tomato, cucumber and organic tofu with light pesto dressing.
my husband ordered the tomato, cucumber and organic tofu salad and he was not impressed. the salad came with about two whole tomatoes in it, a medium amount of cucumber and barely any tofu. again, after waiting ages for just a salad and a stir-fry, the skimpiness of the tofu was a total let down.
sauteed potatoes.
we also shared some sauteed potatoes which were excellent. lightly oiled and perfectly seasoned, there really was nothing to complain about. again though, the whole experience was taken down a notch because we were pretty grumpy about the wait.
as you can see in the picture above, the restaurant was by no means full…but it still took us about 20 minutes after we’d finished eating to attract our waitress’ attention and ask for the bill. she would just disappear into the kitchen for long periods of time with nobody left manning the restaurant. i am guessing this was just a one time thing…maybe there was a disaster back there or someone called in sick that evening, because 1 server for the entire fucking place just wasn’t working out.
so even though our last experience at 222 veggie vegan was pretty meh, i will definitely go back. i’ve been in the past and had some great food, i am hoping this night was just a fluke. plus, our appetizer kicked some major ass. better yet, when i return i will hit up the all-you-can-eat vegan lunch buffet. that way i can serve myself and get my food immediately…problem solved.
222 veggie vegan
Tags: black bean, england, london, potatoes, salad, stir-fry, tofu
222 North End Road
London W14 9NU
020 7381 2322
7 responses to “222 veggie vegan in london: not worth the wait” 
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That tomato thing looks like a monstrosity! That’s exactly the sort of dish that people think of and laugh about when making fun of what vegans eat… a bowl of soggy, bland tofu with a tomato on stuck on top. Good grief!
I’m usually pretty easy to please and don’t often complain, but after a wait like that if they put that dish in front of me, I would have sent that hot mess back and walked out.
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And hour and 15 minutes for those two meals?! Did they make your seitan from scratch or something? That’s insane!
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haha, I was thinking along the same lines as Brit, did they make the tofu from scratch?
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haha, so funny this place totally rocked for us! It takes like 45 minutes because the chef owner makes everything from scratch in back. He doesn’t own a deep frier. We had his tofu mix burger, he mixed it with beans, and tomatoes and so many fresh herbs and then baked it all for us along with potatoes and delivered the best meal we’ve had in the UK so far! He was super nice and came and visited with us and remembered when we came in the day before to see if he could meet our needs and said he was waiting for an oil free order all night (we ended up coming back the next day) He’s definitely a vegan after our own hearts!!! Big ups for 222!
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Kristin Opdahl November 2nd, 2009 at 08:36
I’ve visited 222 several times, and I have always been satisfied with everyting: The food is delicious and the staff are very friendly and efficient. It’s one of my two favourite veggie restaurants in London. The only time I’ve been disappointed was when I ordered the 222 burger, which didn’t look nor taste like a burger at all. But apart from that: no complaints from me 🙂
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This was the worse restaurant I have ever been. First of all we had to wait about 40 min to get our food and there weren’t even that many people in the restaurant.
But when I asked for the pasta(i’m a celiac) , I was told that it was made of rice and I can tell you that it is impossible that it was only rice as I’ve never been so sick. And i wasn’t the only one as my friend as well is a celiac, was sick as well.So please if you have the same problem please never eat there!
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I live nearby and have eaten dinner there about 6 times and the food’s always come in a timely manner. Waiting so long is awful and I hope it was a fluke. I’ve also never seen the place full and there is always only server. But the food’s always been tasty. I’ve always ordered the daily special.
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vegan all you can eat buffet at 222 veggie vegan in london | quarrygirl.com December 19th, 2009 at 07:53
[…] on a previous london trip, we had a bad dinner experience at 222. after this amazing lunch though, i can’t wait to give their dinner another […]
Foodeater March 28th, 2009 at 12:09