THE GATE, HAMMERSMITH

I'm an omnivore. I eat almost anything so am lucky enough to be able to eat wherever I want. Most restaurants have a choice of dishes, so those  who don't or can't eat something can choose a dish that they can eat, but the selection's normally limited, so for vegetarians to have a restaurant serving a full vegetarian menu must be a relief. Especially when it's as good as The Gate. I'd heard about The Gate as it's in my local-ish area but hadn't been until I was invited to try it out recently. The Gate Restaurant is just behind Hammersmith Appollo and is in a beautifully light room with massive windows.

Not only do they have a great veggie menu but I really liked the drinks options too. Liv and I started with a really refreshing elderflower and cucumber fizz, made with elderflower syrup, cucumbers and soda water (funnily enough!). I've had versions of this before and this was a brilliant one. Other soft drink options were a palauxma - pink grapefruit, limes, honey, mint and soda; carrot, beetroot, ginger and celery juice; or fresh mint tea. After our elderflower fizzes we shared a carafe of white wine.

For starters we shared a courgette flower filled with sweet potato, goats cheese, pine nuts and basil, coated in crisp batter, served with puy lentil salsa and a garlic & lemon aioli...
 

And peppers filled with artichoke, hazelnuts, roasted garlic served with black olive tapenade and basil pesto...

Both were wonderful. SO full of flavour. The courgette flower had the perfect amount of crispy batter and was filled with a delicious pesto-y, sweet potato mix. I loved the garlic and lemon aioli with it. I was expecting the peppers to be larger and stuffed with whole bit of artichoke and veg, but the delicate presentation worked really well, and again, so tasty.

We shared aubergine teriyaki for mains - char-grilled aubergine layered with coriander pesto, roasted red peppers, shitake mushrooms & horseradish, coated with crispy breadcrumbs & served on stir-fried noodles with a pickled ginger & mango salsa, and a bowl of sautéed kale for mains. Like the peppers I thought it would look different than it did - I'd thought there would be aubergine cubes rather than the sandwich we were given, but despite the slightly odd presentation it was delicious. Earthy flavours lifted by the warmth of the ginger and juicy mango. Liv said she wasn't a massive fan of kale but we both thought this kale was one of the best versions we'd tried.

The Gate is fab. They've got 2 branches in London - the other one's in Islington and more info on both here. I didn't miss meat or fish from the menu at all and really liked all the dishes we tried - you definitely don't have to be veggie to like The Gate, though it's an excellent place if you are!