Chefs Amanda Powley and Philip Taylor joined forces 20 years ago to open Terre à Terre, the result of a shared ambition to offer food without meat that stretched the boundaries of taste rather than being curtailed by the missing element.

The Chefs

Chefs Amanda Powley and Philip Taylor met and joined forces 20 years ago to open Terre à Terre, the result of a shared ambition to offer food without meat that stretched the boundaries of taste rather than being curtailed by the missing element. Terre à Terre turned vegetarianism into indulgence more than abstinence. What began as a 30 cover restaurant set up with minimal funds has become one the most exciting and successful vegetarian restaurants in the UK, with an international reputation. A team of 50 chefs and service staff work hard to deliver a recognisably unique Terre à Terre product, food and service combined. After a fire in 2012, that destroyed the kitchen, Terre à Terre has bounced back with great pride offering a dining experience not to be missed and one that you will want to repeat time after time! Where else will you enjoy ‘Better Batter’ or a ‘Congee Puff Cluster’!

The Bottle

Recioto di Soave San Zeno 2006

Terre à Terre has championed organic wines for more than 18 years, working closely with companies like Vintage Roots sourcing wonderful vegetarian and vegan wines that represent the best of organic and biodynamic viticulture. They have chosen to present this delightful Italian desert wine made by Fasoli Gino Veneto, a real family-run business with a passion for sheer quality devoted to organic production since 1980. This breathtakingly good sweet wine has a clear taste of honeyed apricots. Absolute nectar! The best bunches of grapes – in this case those with the highest sugar level and with a low number of grapes – are selected from the various Garganega vineyards. Another selection is made in the winery and the bunches are hung on vertical nets where they are left to dry for five or six months. This is a perfect match for the sweet, aromatic coconut and pistachio wafers, also great with cheese and its complexity means that it only can improve with time.

Recipe – taken from Terre à Terre, The Vegetarian Cookbook

Coconut ice and pistachio wafers served with raspberry and rose water frappé.

These snappy little pistachio loaded wafers are lovely to munch on their own (vegan, too), but are irresistible coupled with the cooling combination of luscious rose scented ruby raspberry crush and creamy rum spiked coconut ice.

Pistachio wafers (v)

6 filo pastry sheets

100g soya margarine, melted

150g pistachio nuts, peeled and finely chopped

Line a baking tray with greaseproof paper. Lay a sheet of filo on the baking tray, brush with the melted margarine and sprinkle with the pistachios. Repeat this process three more times. After you have sprinkled on the last of the pistachio layers, lay a sheet of filo on the top, and brush with melted margarine. Then lay one more sheet of filo on top, also giving this final sheet a brush of margarine. Place a sheet of greaseproof paper over the pastry and flatten all the sheets together, smoothing them with your hands. Put a baking tray on top to weigh the pastry down and bake at 180ºC/gas mark 4 for 25 minutes. While still hot, remove the top layer of paper and cut the pastry into required shapes – we like to cut ours into triangles. Store in an airtight container.

Raspberry and rose water frappé

250g ripe raspberries

20ml rose water

icing sugar to taste

Put the raspberries and rose water in a mixing bowl, sprinkle with icing sugar and crush with a fork, leaving some of the fruit quite chunky. Refrigerate until needed.

Coconut glacé

500ml Sugar Syrup (see page 21)

400ml coconut milk

100g creamed coconut

25ml malibu rum

Warm the sugar syrup, coconut milk and creamed coconut in a saucepan until they blend together. Remove from the heat, add the Malibu rum and mix well. When cool, churn the mixture in an ice cream maker and freeze until required. Alternatively, if you do not have an ice cream maker, place the mixture in a container suitable for freezing and freeze until slushy. Remove the slushy ice mix from the freezer and whisk until the icy lumps are broken up and the mixture is smooth. Place back into the freezer and repeat this whisking and chilling process until the sorbet reaches the consistency required. Freeze ready to use.

To assemble

icing sugar to dust

crushed ice

50g coconut chips, toasted

Sprinkle the wafers with icing sugar and put under a hot grill for 20-30 seconds to give them a nice shiny glaze. Mix the rose water raspberries with some crushed ice, and place in frozen shot glasses. Serve the glazed pistachio wafers with little glasses of raspberry and rose water frappé and with scoops of coconut glacé sprinkled with toasted coconut chips.