Last Night's Vegetarian Feast Night Formal Hall

Why eat a Vegetarian diet?

• Research shows that vegetarians are at lower risk for heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, colon cancer, and prostate cancer. Vegetarian diets might also protect against diverticular disease and gallstones.

• The UK’s Food Climate Research Network suggests that food production from farm to fork is responsible for between 20-30 percent of global green house gas emissions.
  Livestock production is responsible for around half of these emissions. The more meat we produce and eat the bigger that carbon footprint will get. A sustainable future demands that we cut down - and yet between 1961 and 2007 the world population increased by a factor of 2.2, but meat consumption quadrupled, and poultry consumption increased 10-fold.

Last night marked the beginning of our initiative to promote vegetarian food as an alternative to meat and fish. As you can see from above, there are several reasons why a vegetarian diet makes sense; lower co2 emmisions, less saturated fat, lower risk of disease. Each of these arguments are valid, but what I really want to promote, is the great variety of vegetarian recipes and dishes our kitchen produces.

 We recently bought two great vegetarian cookbooks, Pure Vegetarian by Paul Gayler, and Terre a Terre by Amanda Powley.

Both of these books are full of exciting and interesting recipes. Terre a Terre is actually the name of a great vegetarian restaurant in Brighton, and Pure Vegetarian won the Gourmand World Cookbook Award.

Last nights menu featured two recipes from Pure Vegetarian, beginning with roasted pepper passata with basil yoghurt and tomato tartare. Passata is made from ripe tomatoes that have been puréed and sieved to remove the skin and seeds. It is sold in jars and can be smooth or chunky depending on the sieving. We served ours warm with some the lovely garnishes.

 Next up, we served a silky smooth lime and mint sorbet. All our sorbets and ice creams are made using the amazing Pacojet machine we purchased last year.
Used as a sorbet and ice cream maker, Pacojet produces an end product of the highest quality when using only fresh, natural ingredients. No Preservatives, additives, stabilizers nor taste enhancers (commonly found in commercially-available mixes) are needed.

 Our main course featured a Kerala pumpkin curry with cinnamon rice and beetroot raita. This colourful dish originates from Kerala, a state in India. It is located on the south-western region of the country.

 For the sweet, we served a lovely green pistachio cake with strawberry ice cream. We use only the best 'super green' pistachios when making this great cake!

I hope that everyone who dined last night enjoyed the unique vegetarian menu!

Bon Appetite!