Top grub for veggies is ... beans on toast!

CUSTOMERS who were asked what exciting vegetarian dishes they’d like to see at their local pub chain asked for... beans on toast.

Locals told Chef & Brewer bosses they wanted the most basic of veggie meals to liven up their menus. Second on the list was egg on toast – with the distinctly uninspiring vegetable soup in third place.

The firm wanted to exploit the fact that people are eating less meat by adding more tempting non-meat options at its 136 pub-restaurants.

But bosses were shocked at the lack of imagination, despite the wealth of vegetarian inspiration on UK cookery shows.

TV chefs like Rick Stein, Jamie Oliver and the Hairy Bikers have travelled to the Far East and the Mediterranean to bring meat-free marvels to a wide British audience.

But all that customers seem to want at Chef & Brewer is for kitchen staff to open a can of

‘Old habits die hard’

beans and put two slices of bread in a toaster. The company styles itself as a chain of classic country pubs and its current vegetarian options include a roasted vegetable jalfrezi, a vegetarian ‘fish and chips’ – made with battered halloumi cheese – and a pesto orzo pasta salad.

It organised a competition to find two new veggie dishes following a study which found almost half of Britons – 46 per cent – are eating less meat than a decade ago.

Beans on toast (60 per cent), egg on toast (59 per cent) and vegetable soup (58 per cent) came out on top as the most popular meat-free dishes in an initial survey. The firm is hoping for more creative choices when it comes to the final vote. Sally Whittaker of Chef & Brewer said: ‘Old habits die hard.’