Veggie heaven in Kingston

Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon is 30 years old this week, an album that beautifully articulates the strains of madness in ordinary life. It stayed in the US charts for 15 years, which is a record for, erm, a record.

I often hear that album today, in hip boutiques and trendy environments. In our so-called New Age, classic psychedelia sounds spot on. But we have a review to write here, man, and here comes a spookily weak connection. What about all that pulses-driven vegetarian food our hippie aunts were eating back in 1973? How does it taste to a contemporary audience? If you want to know, then head straight for Riverside Vegetaria, where you can watch graceful swans and disgraceful party boats drift by while feasting on brown rice with everything.

It is 80 per cent vegan and organic, with a big nod to the wheat-free massive too. The menu here has managed to make international that particular type of Southern-Indian food that a City boy would call hippie feed. In addition to many Indian and Sri Lankan (the owner's native country) dishes, expect tofu teriyaki, red lentil and avocado kedgeree or Caribbean casserole.

There are times when a stolidly healthy carbohydrate bender is all one craves, and if you are that one, go now. Run to Kingston. This is just the sort of saintly food I like to binge on after a toxic weekend.

It won a Vegetarian Society Award last year and what we got was the sort of vegetarian food which is difficult to prettify. A mushroom dip, which came with crudités, looked a little bit like grey and white pigeon poo. The big potato balls with chilli sauce were somewhere between a sag aloo and an onion bhaji - tasty, compelling and simple eating, but to look at, a couple of deep-fried cricket balls. Gramdal vadai was a cross between peanut cookies and falafel in flavour and appearance. It came with a coconut sambal which was unpleasantly cold.

By the time our mains came we already felt full, as though an anchor had been dropped in our bellies. H. had the aubergine in peanut sauce. The aubergine was fried just right in a gram flour, but the peanut sauce and brown rice sent her over the top. She pecked at her food like a dying seagull might a discarded chip, her heart not in it. My casserole had a warming spiciness to it, but I zoned in on a butter bean, a kidney bean and many other beans sitting among the fresh veggies. My eyes said to my belly, 'We're a lot bigger than you are.'

The bistro-style dining room must be bliss in summer, with a slice of riverside path and lots of healthy bites to graze on with vegan wine or a vegan mango lassi. I am glad this place exists. On the right day after the wrong weekend I would flog my granny for their nut roast or masala dosa. The owner is a follower of Sai Baba - an Indian avatar who unites the beliefs of the five major faiths. There are short words of his teachings on the menu and I end on this in the hope it will bring you happiness. 'Be good, see good, do good. That is the way to God.'

The Riverside Vegetaria
High Street, Kingston Upon Thames, KT1 1HN