Scarthin Books



Scarthin books in the Derbyshire town of Cromford is one of my new favourite places. To start with it's one if those lovely old bookshops with mezzanine floors, lots of little rooms and a warren like feel to it. Books are a mixture of new and second hand and I could spend all day in there. To top all that they have a fabulous vegetarian cafe!


All of the menu items are vegetarian and on the day we were there all the savoury items could be veganised. For example our Homity pies could be made topped with dairy or non-dairy cheese. I'd never had Homity Pie before but it's gone on my list of comfort food to create at home this winter. I'll be trying out this recipe from Deerly Beloved Bakery.


There was a nice selection of beautifully displayed home made cakes with vegan and gluten free options. The picture shows just a few.


We went for chocolate cake and it was one of the best chocolate cakes I've had. It had a good crumb without being in the least dry. I find vegan cakes in cafés can often veer between being dry and crumbly or too dense and oily but this was spot on. It was so good I really wanted to ask the staff what recipe they used but it was a super busy Sunday afternoon and I didn't want to mither them. I'm going to send them a link to this blog and hopefully they'll let me know!


Once we'd finished eating Matt went off to the music book room and I got happily lost in the vegan cookery section. I've never seen such a great vegan cookery section in a bookshop, it was such a lovely surprise.


I've only bought one cookery book this year so I treated myself to a copy of Vegan Chocolate by Fran Costigan. This looks like a very impressive book with tons of recipes including handmade chocolate and drinks as well as the expected cakes and desserts. Has anyone got this and what have you tried?

Comments

  1. Hasta La Vegan4 November 2014 at 11:29

    That book is great! The chocolate panna cotta and the white choc cheesecake are amazing

    ReplyDelete
  2. Amey4 November 2014 at 16:59

    What a special spot. Books and cozy veg food - what a combo! I have Fran's Chocolate book and I love looking through it so much - but I still haven't made anything from it! Shame on me!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Panda With Cookie4 November 2014 at 21:59

    That sounds like my dream space.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Joey9 November 2014 at 20:43

    You always find some really interesting vegan food in places I'd never expect. I've never heard of homily pie, but having checked out the Deerly Beloved recipe, I can totally see the appeal. Perfect winter stick to your ribs stuff! Plus, cakes. How much better can one place get?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Deerly Beloved Bakery9 November 2014 at 20:49

    Thanks for sharing my recipe! Homity Pie is sooo good, especially at this time of year! X

    ReplyDelete
  6. vegan.in.brighton14 November 2014 at 12:06

    That pie! That cake! What a cool spot. You'll have to do a review of the cookbook, it's been on my to-buy list for so long but I can't justify it because it'd just be going into storage in January - basically I want to live vicariously through your chocolatey experiences!

    ReplyDelete

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