Maoz

I've re-named West Hampstead; 'West Ham-n-eggs', because that's all there seems to be on the menu around there. A plethora of meat heavy restaurant and cafe menus made a spontaneous food adventure a little despondenet for two vegetarians. We ultimately settled upon going into an 'upmarket Wetherspoons' pub called The Lion, which had three veggie options (admittedly slightly more interesting than the usual gumpf) only to find out that they weren't serving food - at 2pm on a Sunday - for non-specific reasons for an unknown ammount of time. Frustrating, because a lot of tables around us were enjoying recently cooked meals. So, we left, got on a bus hoping to find a table at Mildred's in Soho, only to discover that they don't open on Sundays (again the curse of spontaneous quests), with tummys rumbling we ventured into Soho to a little vegetarian fast-food place I'd eaten at before (usually when drunk).

Maoz is very simple in so much as you get given a pitta with falafel in, you can pay a bit more and have avocado (as I did) or hummus (as Hannah did) and there are other options such as feta and boiled egg, or super meal combos, etc. We also went for some Belgian chips (chunky and crunchy) to warm us up on this chilly Winter's afternoon.

Once you're armed with your pitta pocket you prance around the salad bar stuffing in as much as is humanly possible; I'm personally keen on the red cabbage, some roast carrots, a bit of coleslaw-type stuff, a few gherkins, one chilli and a generous squirt of tahina sauce.

Then comes the tricky part, figuring out how to fit this in your mouth, which usually results in wimping out and picking away at the innards with a fork. It's simple, tasty, entirely veggie friendly and reasonably priced, especially if you're a cunning food-architect and can cram as much as I can into your pitta!

O.x

Maoz

43 Old Compton Street

Westminster

London W1D 6HG

020 7851 1586

http://www.maozusa.com/