Have it all: Sen Viet Vegan’s sharing house platter gives you a taste of everything from summer rolls to salted chilli tofu
Like most of the eating establishments on the “Pho Mile” in London’s Shoreditch, Sen Viet Vegan Restaurant is family run.
The history of the 10 or so Vietnamese eateries on or around Kingsland Road dates back to the late 1970s when thousands of refugees left Vietnam for a safer life and were resettled by the then government in Britain. Individual families were dispersed across the country, but over time naturally found themselves gravitating towards and putting down roots nearer to extended family and friends.
Nowadays Kingsland Road is to pho – a popular Vietnamese noodle soup dish – what Brick Lane is to curry. Unlike the other restaurants, Sen Viet Vegan, previously vegetarian focused due to the owners’ cultural and religious beliefs, is now fully vegan and has been since April 2022.
It’s an unassuming little place on this busy street, almost empty when we arrived at 1pm on a Wednesday, and we were seated by the window. I stared out on to what was once an old Roman road leading towards Kingsland, an ancient settlement in modern day Dalston.
Delicious: the dau hu kho is a tasty feast of caramelised vegetables and tofu
And I looked down at the menu with its luridly coloured photos, which, to be honest, and as usual, I’d already perused more than casually online. Despite my research I couldn’t choose. My inclination was to go for safe, tried and tested food; who could go wrong with a classic tofu and coconut curry? But there was a strong feeling among the three of us that a little more experimentation might yield dividends.
Starters were a no-brainer. Why have one thing when you can have everything? So we unanimously opted for the house platter to share. At £14 a person, this covered pretty much everything from summer rolls to salted chilli tofu, and the portions were generous enough for us all to have one of each and then some. The tofu texture was perfect while its batter managed to be both crisp and fragrant, the rolls with satay dip were fresh, crunchy and tangy, and the grilled betel leaves with black fungus and shiitake mushrooms were intriguingly piquant and umami.
For mains, there was a whole section on the menu called classic Vietnamese family courses, which felt the most authentic way to go, except that the words “banana” and “caramelised” kept appearing. I wasn’t the only one there with a distaste for mixing the sweet and savoury. Names such as marine tofu caramel and tomato sauce, and caramelised vegetables and tofu in clay pot were way out of the comfort zone of my somewhat pedestrian tastebuds, but the most culinarily adventurous of us who did opt for the dau hu kho (the clay pot dish) said it was delicious. It certainly looked good.
The good stuff: the excellent presidential bun cha with spring roll and rice
Having asked the waitress for advice, I took the presidential bun cha, mainly because, once again, it seemed to have a lot of elements. What arrived was incredibly inviting on the eye, and very flavoursome. As a rule, fake meat plant protein isn’t something I’d order when there’s a tofu alternative, but, damn, this was good stuff, with a just-right chewy texture and rich multi-layered flavour. It came with a spring roll and vermicelli or rice.
Once again, I’d eaten too much to want afters, but there were four choices on offer, mainly creamy puddings, with one interesting-looking fried ice-cream dessert, which for novelty value alone would have been my choice.
Next time maybe. I say this with confidence as, having just been there, I’ve already booked my next visit in a few weeks time. Reasonably priced and with a friendly staff serving flavour-rich traditional food, Sen Viet Vegan gets the full five stars from me.
Mention the words vegan and Greece in the same sentence and anyone who has ever visited the country will tell you how superb the herbivorous options are. Edible plants, it’s true, spring up like weeds through cracks wherever there’s a vacant patch of earth, and the corner stores – or supermarkets as they are generally referred to – are fronted by trays of brightly coloured, often supersized, fruit and vegetables. Baby figs drip from the trees, vivid orange apricots crushed underfoot lie in their own juice on the pavements, and lemon and lime trees grow wild.
So self-catering is a great option in Greece for those of us who love the veg. As well as fresh produce, gigantes beans, olives and oat milk, often in a range flavours, are widely available in even the smallest of villages.
But while recently spending two weeks on the stunning island of Lefkada, there were inevitably points when I wanted a night off cooking and also times when I simply craved a great fat coconut-oil-oozing veggie burger and chips; processed vegan products, along with sweet treats, simply aren’t on the shelves at all. I’d been there before, thus though my tooth isn’t really all that sweet, I’d squirrelled a few cereal bars and a packet of biscuits or three into my suitcase to tide me over. I also found that many of the shops had, if you cared to dig deeply enough into the ice-cream fridges, the odd vegan Magnum smiling up from the depths. That was enough to keep me going.
Vegan pizza: one of the options at Apico
I was there on retreat, staying with a group, and there were, therefore, times when I had little to no say in the choice of restaurant. When this happened, I would immediately be directed towards several dishes that appeared to be vegan-friendly, although my advice would also be to check and double check with the waiter, being quite specific about what you can’t eat. Generally vegan-safe and incredibly tasty is gemister. This traditional meal in its veggie incarnation consists of peppers and huge tomatoes stuffed with rice and vegetables and baked in an oven for around 25 minutes and often served surrounded by long roasted potatoes. The other commonly seen food is briami, which is basically a Greek roasted ratatouille. With both of these, as with the ubiquitous Greek salad, be sure to ask in advance about feta, which pops up everywhere.
When I had more free choice in terms of eating venues, there were a few places I kept going back to. There are no dedicated vegan cafés on Lefkada, but, if you hire a car during your stay, the Happy Cow app easily guides you to a place with suitable options within 45 minutes or so of your starting point anywhere on this small island. Without a car, the island’s main town – also called Lefkada – is easily reached by public transport or taxi from wherever you’re staying.
My personal favourite-find choices begin in Lefkada town, with the restaurant Arodo, located at Dimitri Golemi 10. This super-friendly restaurant serves traditional Greek fare, is situated right by the harbour with the ever-present hills in the distance, and has around 15 clearly labelled (VG) vegan options, small dishes and mains, on the menu. On seeing such comparatively vast choice, we excitedly ordered so much food that the waiter told us politely but firmly, “Stop, this is too much.”
Vegan gyros: perfect for taking the edge off ‘hanger’ at Sivota
The staff were knowledgeable and the owner told us that he loved vegans because “they are so strong”. Even after cutting down on the chow, our starters were bread and garlic bean dip (on the house), mushrooms, spicy peppers, chickpea patties and courgette fritters. For mains we had pasta with olive oil and garlic, and stuffed tomatoes and peppers with rice. This was my favourite, and my largest, meal of the holiday, if not of my year.
Our original plan had been to visit Chop n Roll round the corner for dessert, again a Happy Cow recommendation. In the end we were too full for ice cream, but it looked like a potentially interesting place if you manage to keep enough space in your belly. Specialising in Thai stir-fried/rolled ice cream, it offers vegan coconut version with toppings such as raspberry, pistachio, Oreos and mango. The reviews that I’ve read have been mixed. It’s the kind of pudding, apparently, that you either love or hate. You’ll find it at Ioannou Mela 16.
Haven for the hungry: the beautiful village of Sivota on Lefkada
We were hungry to the point of hangry when we arrived, having somehow managed to miss lunch, and it now being around 3.30pm, so it was a godsend to find this place in the little picturesque village of Sivota, and again we sat outside right by a small marina. There were a few vegan options clearly marked, including a burger, and overnight oats. We lunched on the vegan gyros with the most amazing curly, crinkly, crispy chips, and took away a hefty hunk of banana bread for later – the only slab of vegan cake we managed to find on the whole trip.
I was based in Nikiana, and located there is, perhaps, my number one eatery on the island: Apico. With vegan options for any time of the day, we were catered for from breakfast to midnight. They offer a club sandwich, two dairy-free pizzas, and a magnificent burger and chips. Particularly impressively, this is a restaurant that really gets vegans, to the point where they made it clear, without my asking, that I should avoid one specific salad as the dressing contained honey. And ultimately my needs being understood without the necessity for constant explanation is the most important thing of all.
Ionian idyll: the view of Nikiana from the mountains
Three cats interrupted studying fish in the harbour at Sivota, Lefkada
At first it seems as if there are scores of feral cats wandering the lanes of Nikiana, lurking around the industrial-sized rubbish bins near restaurants and blocks of flats, shading themselves under parked cars, sitting on empty plots of land with thousand-yard stares in their eyes, drifting in and out of a half-built villa. They are seemingly everywhere.
After a few days of regular contact with them you begin to recognise individuals, and the apparently ubiquitous feline community is smaller than at first it seems; maybe a couple of dozen or so, which is a strong presence in a small village. There are certainly enough cats here that if this were England, say, and not the island of Lefkada in Greece, something would Have To Be Done.
Here they are a natural component of village life, and to a cat lover at least, they are wonderful citizens alongside the incredibly friendly local people.
Some of these cats are battered and scarred from the wild lives they lead, while others look pristine, as if they’d managed to dodge every existential fight that had come their way. A charity does a bit of neutering from time to time when there is enough money, and locals and visitors put out food here and there. There is even a big wooden box-like structure on one pavement, with the words “Kat-Cat Hotel” painted on it.
I never saw any rats here. It’d be a foolish rodent to try.
I was thinking about this when a shopkeeper told me about snakes. “The snakes come down from the mountains to swim in the sea,” she said. Er, OK; but she’s the local, so fine. “Yes, they come here to swim, but if we didn’t have the cats, the village would be full of snakes.” Her eyes fill with impassioned light as she paints a picture of these cats fighting off hordes of snakes, and even mentions scorpions a few times.
There are indeed snakes and scorpions in Greece, but it’s hard to imagine such epic animal battles in this peaceful village, and even harder to fact-check, but my partner suggests that maybe the shopkeeper’s story is not meant to be taken literally, that perhaps this is some kind of allegory. I like this.
I’m not sure whether any of these creatures were involved in keeping mountain snakes out of the Ionian waters in which I swam, but here are some of the cats I crossed paths with in the past fortnight (mainly in Nikiana, but a few at a handful of other places on Lefkada)…
Licking her chopsHere’s looking at youSurvival of the toughFour legs goodDown but not outCautiously curiousStreet fruit won’t doDumpster divingIn search of supperRich pickingsThat way thereKeep on movingWatching the watcherSafe distanceElegant beastA swirl of cats enjoying fistfuls of kibbles, early evening in Nikiana, Lefkada
Where is my head? My experience of headlessness via clumsy digital fakery
REVIEW Headless Way: A Day With Richard Lang
The room is filled with smiling, headless people, or so they are claiming to be. As am I: a headless man looking at headless men and women looking back each other. Our teacher, Richard Lang, gleefully, if a little bafflingly, says we are all “face to no face”. We are here to learn more about what this means via the Headless Way.
This purports to be a direct and instant route into the experience of pure consciousness – a state of open awareness in which all phenomena emerge, from thoughts to sights, sounds, sensations, everything.
It’s a state pointed to in many spiritual traditions, including different strands of classical yoga as well as branches of Buddhism such as Mahamudra and Zen. These traditional approaches hold that the experience is always there with you, instantly available, but it’s taken as read that you need to spend a long time meditating or otherwise practising to get it. The result is nothing less than enlightenment.
With the Headless Way, though, there’s no need to shave your head and stare at a wall for years on end; pure consciousness – indeed enlightenment – can be experienced right now by anyone who cares to experience it.
Take a few moments to look out into the world; now notice that you cannot see your head, that all there is to see are the sights out there, that you cannot see the one who sees. That one is pure consciousness, or, as it’s said in the Headless Way, your true nature. This is naturally much simplified and is not intended to convey the concept with any depth, simply to state it in its most basic form.
The approach was first explicated by the English spiritual teacher Douglas Harding in his 1961 book On Having No Head: Zen and the Rediscovery of the Obvious, and since his death in 2007 his torch has largely been carried by his student – and our host today – Richard Lang. The work has had a minor resurgence in recent years thanks to the inclusion of Harding’s teachings, as well as mini courses by his successor, on Sam Harris’s meditation app Waking Up, which is where I first came across it a few years ago.
All seeing: Iconic head and bowed head on the spiritual path
I’ve found it an excellent little mind hack and, working with it with varying degrees of commitment over time, it’s helped to enrich my meditation practice, clarifying in a down-to-earth way an experience that’s traditionally conveyed in more esoteric language. That said, I do not consider it to have made me an enlightened being. I think of the Headless Way as a kind of parlour trick, albeit a powerful one that can offer useful pointers on the seeker’s path.
Richard has been generous in sharing this work and the practices – or experiments, in Headless Way parlance – associated with it. There is a free app that amounts to a comprehensive course in the method, as well as a website with plenty of useful material and a YouTube channel, not to mention regular live Zoom sessions where the work is explored. This is an honourable exception to the general rule of the modern industrial spiritual complex of monetised Buddhism and mindfulness.
While I had some familiarity with the Headless Way from practices learnt online, I was keen to learn more at an in-person workshop, which is how I found myself in a room full of the headless in Stoke Newington, London. I can’t say I really learnt much more than I already knew about it, but it was interesting to spend a day practising with fellow seekers.
Richard is an inspiring teacher whose enthusiasm for what he is offering is palpable and built on years of experience – he started practising with Harding when he was 17 and is today 71. He spent the first part of the morning session outlining the theory of the Headless Way, which is essentially an approach to non-dual awareness, then guided us into some of the exercises used to convey it. These were engaging, and did what they were supposed to do.
There was an underlying feeling for me, however, that while our teacher kept stressing that we shouldn’t accept anything on his say-so alone, but test it for ourselves, he was clearly holding up precise hoops to jump through, and that we did. In particular, it felt like we were being strongly nudged to express what we were experiencing in the very specific, sightly corny language of the Headless Way – face to no face, I am space for you, you are space for me, etc.
Long haul: The insights of open awareness come from dedicated practice – or so the records of thousands of years suggest
It was at this point that the whole thing began to feel a little groupthink to me, if not borderline culty. Clearly no one can force you to have a particular mental experience, but somehow in situations like this it’s very easy to simply go with the flow, to not be the awkward customer, especially when guided with such passionate confidence by the teacher.
There was very little space for personal reflection on what we were doing and the group discussions were both tightly controlled and very brief. There was a lot to get through, perhaps, but I kept wishing for more time simply to absorb and reflect on the practices.
I struggled a bit with the afternoon session, which involved more experiments but this time with a lot more inter-personal contact between participants. Richard kept making the point that it was important to find and spend time with others who follow the Headless Way, to express the creeds of the method out loud; he called it being among friends. Essentially, this is the same thing that yogis call sangha, or spiritual community. Which in principle is a good thing.
But it felt to me like a bunch of strangers were being moulded into an instant group of friends by being brought into very close contact – putting arms around each other’s waists, sitting in close one-to-one conversations to say things like, “I am space for you, you are space for me”, and holding hands during a group meditation.
This might work for some people, but to me it felt forced and awkward; I was overwhelmed to the point where I began merely waiting for it all to end. Hand on heart, if I’d known before the afternoon session that things would get so literally hands on, I’d have left after polishing off my packed lunch.
If you’re interested in nondual awareness, I’d definitely encourage you to look into what Richard’s offering. What’s online is excellent, and a workshop like the one I attended would be a breeze to anyone who’s happy with corporate team-building-type work. For those, like me, who are a little less free with hugs, maybe not so much.
My kind of chippy: Battered plant-based sausages and chips at the No Catch Co in Brighton
As a Londoner, Brighton was a place where I occasionally took my son on day trips to the seaside while he was growing up. He’s in his late 20s, and I hadn’t been there since he was 10, so, spurred on by reports that Brighton is the vegan capital of Britain, it was time to pay another visit.
It was midwinter and, much as I love the sea, this cold and rainy trip was the kind of visit where food was the focus rather than staring wistfully out at the waves. There are currently around 25 dedicated plant-based eateries in the city, so during a two-night stay I dined at only a few.
The first place we stumbled on by accident, waiting for check-in time at our accommodation for the weekend. We were hungry and tired – no, let’s be honest, we were on the verge of hangry – when the Vurger Co appeared mirage-like as we stumbled round one of the corners in the maze that constitutes the jewellery section of The Lanes.
We’d been on the hunt for tea and cake, but it turns out what we really needed were burgers, wraps, and truly amazing chips. For me, the absolute star of the show was the nuggets, which you could have with an extra spicy seasoning, and I did. I’m not normally a fake meat fan, but these were addictive, and if you include a Deliveroo, we ate there a few times.
Pie squared: Black truffle, foreground, and four-cheese pizzas at Purezza
That evening we had a table booked at Purezza, a place I have heard so many good things about. I tried one of their pizzas at the Vegan Camp Out festival in 2021, and loved it, so I couldn’t wait to visit one of their restaurants. Purezza was the country’s first dedicated vegan pizzeria, and Brighton was its maiden branch.
This was my birthday meal, and the place itself is suitable for a special occasion or just a casual night out. The service was top notch; we had a really friendly waitress who sprinkled positive vibes wherever she went (even my oftentimes cynical companion was totally charmed).
And the pizzas, with their soft and chewy crusts and the perfect balance of crispness, were as excellent as I’d hoped. I had the black truffle pizza, and Martin had the four cheeses, with a shared side of macaroni cheese. The toppings were good, with none of that semi-transparent glossiness that you sometimes get with melted vegan cheeses. Desserts – cheesecake and tiramisu – were equally delightful. Tiramisu seems to have caught on in restaurants lately, so I’ve had a few, but this was flavoursome, rich and creamy, putting it right up there at the top.
I went rogue and chose a limoncello spritz as my cocktail to end the meal, which was a bad move on my part, tasting as it did like a sort of alcoholic washing-up liquid. But we live and learn, and in fairness to the drink, I did find within me the gastric fortitude to quaff it down.
Looking good: But sadly the limoncello spritz at Purezza tasted like washing-up liquid
The other place I was excited about going to was the No Catch Co. Exactly as it says on the tin, it’s a proper old-school vegan fish and chip shop. We were there when the doors opened at 12:30 and we weren’t the only ones. Inside it’s exactly what you would expect a chippy to be, except that there was nothing on the menu that we couldn’t eat.
I’ve never quite grown into vegan fish, so I had the large battered sausages and chips, while my date had the jumbo battered saveloy. Both meals were great, with perfect chippy chips and an overall heady blend of grease and crunchiness, but we agreed that mine took the slight edge, even if it was just on quantity. They had a deep-fried Oreo dessert on offer, but to be honest we were totally stuffed. One to try another day.
Later that afternoon, however, we did experience the kind of slight… not hunger, perhaps, but space in our stomachs that means you can indulge the sweet tooth a little… and at this point, we got a couple of takeaway desserts from Hunglish that really hit the spot. I particularly loved the nutty, chewy, granola-style flapjacks, but there were some more traditional vegan cakes there too.
Brighton has an amazing vibe as well as a pair of welcoming arms for peckish vegans. I could’ve wandered around the city for another two days and eaten in a different place for every meal, before waddling home for a few days on kimchi and Huel, but I’ll save the remaining venues for next time.
“Dawn on her golden throne began to shine”: December sunrise in Brighton; another visit beckons
There’s also cake: The shop front of Missbake, which has a good selection of vegan offerings
Bologna in Italy has plenty of excellent options for the vegan traveller, a fact that added much to my enjoyment of this unpretentious and friendly city. Here are a few places I tried – and can thoroughly recommend – during a visit a couple of weeks ago. Everywhere I went, I was struck by how warm and helpful the staff were, perfectly happy to talk in English in the face my idiot Italian.
I was on holiday – definitely not on a healthy eating mission – and this place was where I got my outlandishly sweet breakfast every day. Located in the shadow of the city’s Two Towers, it’s not specifically vegan, or even vegetarian, but there is an excellent selection of plant-based food.
Well, by food – in my case at least – I mean to say filled croissants. I had them loaded with chocolate and with crema, a lovely rich custard-like concoction, and also enjoyed an apple strudel-style slice one morning. In addition to the standard blonde vegan croissant, one of the specialities here is a black version. It looks a very unlikely treat – like something the baker burnt (and they are indeed kissed by charcoal) – but they are lovely, with a slightly breadier texture than the regular croissant.
Breakfast rush: The morning queue at Pappare’. See those black croissants just to the left of the woman standing behind the counter – they’re amazing
There was a bit of a queue every morning, but definitely worth it. There was a good vibe lining up watching the staff putting it all together, followed by tasty, reasonably priced croissants. You can eat in or outside, but I took my heavy bagful (to share with my family, honest) back to my apartment.
I was travelling with three foodies who really appreciate the good stuff, but me, I’m an animal, and would probably be at home kneeling in front of a trough. So visiting this place – which is fully vegan – was a little unnerving. It feels upmarket as you walk in and the food, when you see the pictures on the menu, looks what might be described as fussy.
But it turned out to be a wonderful experience. The waitresses were really friendly, going out of their way to make you feel at home. And once I was seated and got over myself, the atmosphere was warm and welcoming. I soon stopped feeling like a peasant who’d wandered into a palace by mistake.
It’s red and it’s a roll: The delightfully presented and very tasty red roll at Botanica Lab
The food was delightful. I had the simply named but spectacularly presented red roll – a roll of thin tomato-infused pastry stuffed with fresh, crunchy vegetables – and shared side orders of salad and fried vegetable chips, followed by a vanilla cheesecake and red fruits. It was really good eating and, to my surprise, very reasonably priced for what felt like a high-end experience (my main was €12.50). I, with my limited palate, was super impressed, as were my foodie peeps.
Down-to-earth soul food
Fram Café (Via Rialto, 22, 40124 Bologna; website [Facebook])
After a tricky journey from Florence, which appeared to be at the centre of an Italian rail meltdown on the day I left, this was the first place we walked into in Bologna, weary and hungry. It was the perfect welcome to the city.
It’s a relaxed, homely vegan café with a range of down-to-earth daily specials. The waitress talked us through the options, unpreachily suggesting a mix of food groups (protein, carbs, etc) to build a nourishing meal. I had a bowl of seitan curry with polenta and salad; it was simple, tasty and satisfying. And also the first time I’ve actually enjoyed polenta. I couldn’t resist a bit of cake to accompany my coffee afterwards; both were excellent (as an aside, I found the coffee served all over Bologna consistently good).
No-fuss fine fare: Seitan curry, polenta and salad at Fram Café
All of us were so impressed with this little gem that we initially thought we might revisit it during our stay; it was only the fact that there were so many other places to try that we didn’t get a chance to do so.
The sky was blue and the sun out after a rainy night, and I was in an excellent mood ambling up down side streets savouring the atmosphere, when Missbake’s tiny shop front caught my attention. It wasn’t just my cakedar; I was taken by two rows of Scrabble tiles stuck on the front promoting love and harmony.
Walk into a cake shop, particularly one that offers creamy-looking cake, and the assumption is usually that there’ll be nothing for my kind. But here there was. Missbake had an extensive selection of vegan cake, as the woman behind the counter showed me. She had this crazy baker’s hat on and smiley eyes; indulge me, please – she had the vibe of a mysterious character in a magic-realist story. Cool welcome.
I had a bit of carrot cake and my partner a strawberry and coconut cake; they were both excellent, as was – as usual in Bologna – the coffee. We took some lavender and lemon biscuits home for later; also very good. Missbake was a lovely little pit stop on a day of idle wandering. It’s kind of easy to miss, but it’s worth making a point of visiting if you like cake (they do other baked goods too).
This was the last place where I ate out in Bologna. Again, we were warmly welcomed, even though we’d clearly walked in at the end of the lunchtime period when the frazzled-looking but friendly staff were preparing to slow down. It’s widely listed as a vegetarian place with some vegan options, but in fact it is almost completely vegan, with a couple of vegetarian options. It’s a trend I’ve observed a fair bit, that; and a good one, losing the secretions of the barbaric dairy industry from menus.
The genuine article: The mainly vegan Italian menu at Uno Caffé Olistico
This was my only traditional Italian meal of the visit. I had mezzelune – a form of pasta I’d never come across before – stuffed with potatoes and pesto, and served with a pear sauce, vegan parmesan flakes and pepper. It seemed an odd combo, but it was absolutely fantastic. Not the hugest portion I’ve ever had, but satisfying none the less, and it was a pleasure to have some food that felt authentically Italian. My partner had gnocchi, which she declared excellent. I finished with coffee and a muffin-style cake, which were both very good indeed.
To finish: Coffee and muffin cake at Uno Caffé Olistico
It wasn’t all eating out
We stayed in an apartment in Bologna and did a fair bit of cooking ourselves. There were lots of supermarkets scattered around the city centre where we stayed, with all the food a vegan could hope to find.
One decent place with a good range of tofu-type stuff was NaturaSì (Via de’ Toschi, 5/e, 40124 Bologna) but I have to give a special mention to Cenerini dal 1946 (Via Santo Stefano, 12/a, 40125 Bologna; website), an excellent fruit and vegetable shop selling high-quality, fresh produce at very reasonable prices right in the city centre. I’m still missing their tomatoes.
Bye bye Bologna: If the gods will it, I will return to this wonderful Italian city
It had been a hell of a year and I was searching the web for something to help put a full stop at the end of one phase of life and kickstart the next bit. Right at the end of 2022, shortly before Christmas and two weeks before my 60th birthday, I had a transient ischaemic attack – or mini-stroke, which makes it sound far more dramatic than I’d care to admit it was – during a lesson with my Year 4 pupils.
As a class, we were watching a short moralistic video about cartoon animals with a dilemma, which was to form the stimulus for a discussion. A few minutes into it, I realised I no longer had a clear idea of what was going on around me. The video played on, although the words had become incomprehensible. Familiar but intangible.
It might sound weird, but what I felt was far more like curiosity than fear. Grasping to find some sort of sense in this situation, I picked up a pen and started to write. My hand moved. My eyes looked down at a Post-it note on which I’d jotted recognisable letters forming gibberish words.
Bay of plenty: The retreat centre’s beach
By the time the video ended, the attack was over. The bell went, and the class left the room. I had no headache, no weakness, nothing. Just an almighty awareness that something major had occurred and that I needed to get help. Shortly afterwards, after arguing adamantly against any further investigation into what had happened with the school nurse and a GP she had called to speak to me over the phone, I was in Accident and Emergency. I’d had both a lucky escape and a wake-up call.
The next six weeks passed in a blur of tests, which revealed nothing. I was fit and healthy enough and this was just one of those things. The doctors prescribed statins and an antiplatelet medication, and I went back to the primary school where I’d taught for 16 years.
Given a reduced timetable by my employers, I could easily have drifted into part-time work, but I’d never pictured myself slowly fading out of teaching. On top of this, I saw the work treadmill, as cosy as mine had seemed, quite suddenly and sharply for what it was. I was stressed and burnt out, and what I felt was an overwhelming sense of relief that I could finally admit this and think about what I wanted out of my remaining years on this planet. By Easter I’d handed my notice in.
Wide open: A view from the retreat centre’s beach over the bay
I knew I wasn’t retiring to a life of slippers and Netflix, although this was simultaneously my greatest fear. Which leads me back to that search.
July and August were a doddle: in the world of education, life runs in terms and I’m used to an eight-week holiday in summer. But what after that? September, the time of new beginnings for everyone involved in schools, was set to be a toughie for me. What I instinctively felt I needed was something far removed from my usual life: a deep breath, a pause in the hamster wheel of life and a chance for a personal regroup. If I wasn’t going back to work I knew I needed some sort of focus and I began to look for a retreat. I’d never been on anything like that before, though, and was a damn sight more sure about what I didn’t want than what I did.
No carefully weighed-out food portions, no group discussions with compulsory contributions, no white coats, no elaborate yoga poses, no shared rooms, no silence unless I wanted it to be so, no talking if I didn’t want to, no service in the form of washing bathroom floors, etc, and above all, no colonic cleansing.
Balcony with a view: There are worse places to watch the world
I know, I know… it all sounds incredibly negative. I was, however, an expert at jumping through other people’s hoops. It was time to march to the beat of a different drummer, at least for a while.
There were many websites with beautifully posed, serene-looking punters sitting cross-legged on mats looking blissed out against a background of brilliant blue sea or greenly fertile mountains. There was an abundance of images of clean, sterile accommodations with white bedding, and green leafy meals. And on I scoured. I was simply looking for the photos of less shiny-looking people with a hint that they had the option to sit more comfortably on chairs.
The first thing that appealed to me about Serenity Retreats when I stumbled across their website was the down-to-earth language and obvious flexibility of what they were offering. The pictures are practical and realistic, showing the beautiful views and the accommodation. No glossy pics of shiny, smiling faces, though in reality there are many, which fits in with the respect for personal space and privacy that dominates this company’s philosophy.
Lodgings: The retreat centre’s accommodation seen from the beach
As I read on, Kim, who founded the company in 2010, spelt out clearly and repeatedly in language that didn’t sound like it was lifted straight from an advertising manual, that the holiday you had with them was entirely in your hands. They offer seven-day solo holidays, all in individual self-catering apartments in several small blocks with a sea view, with as much or as little interaction with the organisers and other guests as you want. I attended the retreat on the Greek island of Lefkada, but Kim – who works with several others including her sister, Jools – runs retreats in the UK and Morocco too.
“Don’t want to take part in the organised programme? Just need to chill? That’s okay. The choice will always be yours: solitude, the company of like-minded people, a week’s course or activities, going on trips or all of the above.” That’s my kind of sell. Under courses, I saw the words, “this is not a bootcamp”. No courses at Serenity start before 10.30am, and even then you attend only what you feel like doing at the time.
From the website, I went straight to the reviews. Mostly five star, again and again they told the story of a place where people had gone in search of “unplugging” from 21st-century life, and found exactly what they needed.
Plain sailing: Boats on the bay at Nikiana
At Serenity you feel looked after from the first interactions via email, through being fetched at the airport, to the welcome meal and walk around the village of Nikiana, and there is always help at the end of a WhatsApp message should you need it. Alongside this is a clear message to do whatever you feel you need to do, and above all to listen to what your body is telling you.
There is only one unbreakable rule at Serenity and that is that your apartment is your castle: you don’t knock uninvited on anyone’s door, you don’t shout up at balconies as you walk past. It’s clearly a formula that works. Sixty per cent of guests return at some point.
Serenity Retreats works with the locals as much as they can, as was obvious when the group walked around the small village on the first day. Kim introduced us to the owners of shops and cafes, and our taxi driver to and from the airport was Panos, the village cabbie.
They offer several different optional courses as well as massages from another local, Giota, who became part of the team in 2017. Included in your holiday is a daily 9.30am mindfulness session held down by the sea. Again, no expectation to attend, and we were told quite specifically not to set an alarm clock, but to come if it felt like the right thing at the time. As meditation has been a proper life-changer for me, I was a regular. Chairs provided.
Home from home: Karen’s retreat room, above and below
I stayed in a first-floor apartment – Maria Middle – which was perfect for me, with a small kitchen and living area and a good-sized, comfortable double bed. We first floorers all had balconies and the ground floor flats all came with small terraces leading on to the beach. Everyone is lulled to sleep by the sound of lapping waves. There are some organised trips should you choose – I didn’t for the most part – and the feedback from all of these was positive. Mostly I sat and stared at the sea or wandered round the village.
I tended to brunch at “home” and then often met up with others for one meal out, generally in the evening. As a vegan, my favourite cafe was Apico, a mere several minutes from my room and with three substantial and labelled plant-based options.
Local tavernas and bakeries rely a little too heavily on dairy alongside the veg for non-meat options. But if you ask, they can always whip up a couple of vegetable dishes. The local produce available in the three small supermarkets in the town was superb and I lived off the truly delicious lemon humous and gigantes beans.
In the other direction: The mountains behind the village
So what did I get out of it? I got that pause. Before heading off, I’d been extremely nervous about how 25 or so strangers could coexist while each getting the level of interaction and solo time they needed. They just did.
We were there for very different reasons, but in common we had the fact that on some level we were all seeking the same thing and that we had all found Serenity. When we were together as a small or a larger group, the respect and companionship among the group was palpable.
I got the confidence that comes with knowing I can and have been on my own adventure and that I did it by myself. Through talking to other people and discovering their own reasons for being there – for we all had a story – I reaffirmed what I knew when I walked out of my classroom for the final time. Life really is too short not to discover how best to live it in a way that works for you.
Make mine a large one: The Sattgrün big plate, heaped with vegan loveliness
As a solo traveller with an appetite for quantity as well as quality when it comes to vegan food, finding the Cologne branch of Sattgrün on the Happy Cow app was a godsend at the tail-end of a busy day.
The food is presented canteen-style, starting with a soup area, where you can help yourself to a small or larger-sized bowl of whatever hearty soup is on offer each day. If thats’s all you fancy, you’ll be paying €5 to €7 for a bowl including bread. A similar size dish of mixed salads costs around the same.
It had been a long day of sight-seeing and I was peckish; I went straight for the large plate size, currently costing around €16 (there are smaller, cheaper options available).
There are around 10 salads and vegetable side dishes available alongside five or six mains. I added a bit of most of the offerings to my plate.
Canteen style: Happy diners get feasting at the Sattgrün serving counter
To give you a flavour of the choices, they included roasted sweetheart cabbage in orange and ginger sauce, lentil curry with chickpeas, fried soya medallions in peanut sauce, tofu stroganoff, and plenty of rice and pasta-type recipes. I’m a huge potato fan so I especially liked the crispy roasties with finely chopped almonds.
In general, the food felt wholesome and it was tasty. And although I was too full for cake on this occasion, I saw some delicious-looking desserts that I’d definitely try next time.
The system was really easy to follow, which is important to me, as is friendly service, and the young woman who took my drinks order was a delight. Again, as a solo traveller, these little interactions make a big difference to your day.
Al fresco: The outdoor eating area at Sattgrün in Cologne
There was a chilled vibe to this restaurant, which had a large, comfortable outdoor area as well as indoor seating. When I went there, it was not over-busy but it was clear that this was a place popular with locals as well as tourists.
Cologne Sattgrün is part of a small chain of restaurants, and there are also branches in Düsseldorf and Essen, which I’d be keen to sample on future visits to Germany.
As an aside, I found this gem, as I find most places I choose to eat in, through Happy Cow. I’d imagine most travellers have this installed, but if you don’t, I can’t recommend it highly enough.
The wholesome vegan brunch at the Cologne branch of Katzentempel
Plant-based brunch in the company of a clowder of rescue cats? There was no way I was going to miss the opportunity when, on a recent European sojourn, I passed a new branch of the German vegan cat cafe chain Katzentempel.
The branch in Cologne, which opened in August 2023, is the 15th Katzentempel to be established in Germany over the past eight years. It is in the heart of Chlodwigplatz, a charming old area of southern Cologne with a small market in the shadow of a 12th-century city gate and myriad quirky little stores and other eateries.
Founders Kathrin Karl and Thomas Leidner, who manage the Munich branch and are responsible for issuing the franchise licenses, say: “The Cat Temple is more than our job – it is our calling and the fulfilment of our dream to make the world a little better.”
It’s a lovely idea, part of the profits are donated to animal charities, and the pair have made a real success of it countrywide. The menu across all the cafes is totally vegan, a deliberate choice made primarily for ethical reasons by the pair.
The cats of Katzentempel show a soporific form of affection for diners
“A vegan meal not only promotes animal welfare and rails against the usual system of factory farming; it also does wonders for the environment,” the founders continue. “For example, did you know that a full 90 per cent of the world’s soya bean harvest and 50 per cent of the grain and corn harvest does not end up on our plates, but in the animals’ feeding troughs?
“We now eat so many animals that keeping them consumes an unimaginable amount of resources and thus destroys our environment, especially the rainforests.”
The Cologne branch of Katzentempel is in the charming Chlodwigplatz district
Katzentempel offers a rich and varied menu consisting mainly of sandwiches, burgers and bowls, along with some tasty-sounding desserts. The meals are all served with a large rainbow of salad. I had the croissantwich brunch, which exceeded my expectations. This was a large croissant, filled with carrot ‘salmon’ and other salad vegetables, served alongside the real star of the show – the scrabbled tofu. The latter was really tasty with a great ‘eggy’ texture.
The service at the bright modern Cologne branch, which was kitted out with an array of ledges and high walkways for the five furry inhabitants to explore, was friendly and warm.
As for the cats themselves… they seemed totally unimpressed by the cooing paying customers around them. They just did that feline thing and pretty much slept through the whole experience.
The Crispy Rice Green Dynamite tasted as good as it looked… but could have been had much cheaper as part of the bottomless sushi option
My biggest takeaway from a recent Sunday lunchtime visit to 123V in the basement at Fenwick department store in London was that next time I’ll have the bottomless sushi.
We arrived hungry, promptly at noon as the restaurant opened, and for a while were the only people there. It’s another plant-based dining experience from the vegan chef Alexis Gauthier, and the place soon started to fill up, as did the outside terrace section.
As a claustrophobe, I’m not a fan of basement dining and tend to avoid restaurants without windows, but this wasn’t an issue at all in 123V, which is a large, airy and pleasant space in which to eat.
The Soba Noodle Tiger Bowl was a mushroom lover’s delight
Two of my companions – this time there were four of us – had gone for the £30 per person limitless package on a previous visit, and been stunned by the array of food presented to them and by the value for money, both in terms of taste and quantity.
This time we went a little rogue and ordered from the main menu starting with two portions of the ‘Prawn’ Tempura at £17 each. As the picture shows, both came in one rather disappointingly small bowl.
We found it a bit perplexing and assumed it was just one of our orders until 10 minutes later when no further food had arrived. No, we were politely assured. The diminutive bowl of tempura in front of us was in fact £34’s worth and enough for four diners.
This is two portions of Tempura crammed into one bowl, a peculiar decision for a restaurant to make on behalf of its customers
Confusion solved, there was still a sour taste lingering in the mouth. It was good tempura, but not that good. However, the meals – this time each one served on a separate plate – were all varying degrees of delicious and we soon snapped out of any remaining snit.
I had the Quesadilla Verde, which was fine, but not the best of the meals. I did get a touch of food envy when I looked at the other culinary delights arriving. The filling was okay, but the outside felt a little dry and crispier than I’ve had before.
Both the Petit Sushi Set and the Crispy Rice Green Dynamite looked beautiful. Both were colourful and fresh, and so appetising to the eye. And like the Prawn Tempura, both would have been included in the bottomless brunch. Maybe you can see where this is going…
Ah, the Pavlova… this kind of stuff can be hard to find in vegan form, and this one was spectacular
The Soba Noodle Tiger Bowl looked excellent to a mushroom lover like myself and was given a firm thumbs up.
For dessert, the Pavlova was delightful. Chewy meringue with raspberry sorbet and vanilla cream. The real star among the sweets was perhaps the Macrons, which we were worried might be a little on the small side, it being fine dining after all. Not at all – there were four large but delicate-looking sandwich cookies with a crisp interior.
Macrons often err on the small side but these were just right
The clientele at that time was completely varied; we were surrounded by families, couples and friend groups. It was a lovely way to spend the early part of a Sunday afternoon.
But for those among us with larger appetites, it’s most definitely the sushi special on any subsequent visits.
