Crocus Café: Lenton’s feel-good café

Surrounded by Lenton’s high-rise flats and the dodgy council estate at the back of Sainsbury’s on Derby Road is the unlikely location for some good food and a friendly face.

In Church Sq. Next door to Crocus Gallery and a place to get your dissertation bound

Inside, it is lined with flower laden wooden tables and at the back there are some comfy sofas that you could happily gossip away a couple of hours.

Excellent people watching out of that window

Serving vegetarian and vegan food for breakfast, lunch and dinner might put a lot of people off but not only was The Tab’s lunch date tasty and filling, it was really cheap.

Good value for money

We went for a halloumi salad which was a Moroccan/Greek feast. There was a lot happening on this plate.

The halloumi was better than a Nando’s side order and it came with cous cous, red cabbage and sultana salad, your normal lettuce and tomato combo, a toasted pitta and a yoghurt dip. Who said vegi food had to be boring?

What did the cheese say when it looked in the mirror?

We also had a Mediterranean vegetable Panini. Doused in pesto and a mystery ‘house sauce’ it beat any toastie we could make at home.

Verdict: Filling and tasty

There is a specials board that promotes the homemade delights of its trusty volunteers and there are plenty of gluten free options too. If we weren’t so full from our healthy lunch, we would have had a slice of cake for pudding.

Check out the toilets too. Graffiti at it’s wisest

Crocus Café hosts regular Come Dine With Crocus events on a Thursday night. 3 courses of vegetarian, vegan, gluten free goodness is £10 and it’s BYOB – sounds like a pretty good value for money to us.

For change from a fiver and a friendly face, make sure Crocus Café is somewhere you go to procrastinate or maybe even revise.

Open Monday to Friday 10am-4pm and Saturday and Sunday 11am- 4pm. Check out their Facebook too.