A guide to plant-based dining in Birmingham

22.08.2023 - 08:17 / nationalgeographic.com

I hear the balti before I see it. It leaves the kitchen sizzling in a blackened metal bowl. It’s a curry to behold — a thick, fiery swamp of spices. A charred, pillowy naan is placed next to it as cutlery. I inhale, set aside any sense of decorum and start tearing and scooping almost before the server turns their back. 

Birmingham has a food scene that does this sort of thing to a person. Home to a pan-global abundance of seriously good restaurants, not to mention more Michelin stars than any UK city outside London, it was described by last year’s Good Food Guide as ‘Britain’s most exciting foodie destination’. 

I’m in town on a mission. A meat-free one. As a vegetarian of just a few years’ standing, and still trying to discern my courgette koftas from my jackfruit tacos, I’m here to sample some of the city’s countless veggie and vegan options. Shababs proves a good place to start. Its emphasis is on authentic, well-priced baltis with over 30 vegetarian options on the menu. 

Balti in broad terms describes a curry made in a thin steel bowl over a hot flame, then served and eaten in the same scorched vessel in which it was cooked. The method keeps the curry hot and retains its flavour. While the original style is associated with Northern India and Pakistan, the version typically served in the UK — using vegetable oil rather than ghee — originated in Birmingham’s large Pakistani/Kashmiri community in the 1970s. “Some balti cooking bowls are more than 25 years old,” says Shababs’ affable owner Zaf Hussain, before offering me a tarka dal of astonishing depth.

The next day, having worked up an appetite on a long canalside walk, I visit Land, in the city centre’s Great Western Arcade, where bakers, barbers and bottle shops line the covered passageway. With an entirely plant-based seasonal menu, it entered the Michelin guide for the first time in 2023. Birmingham’s a fitting home; the city was the birthplace of the Vegan Society, in 1944, and almost half a century before that, it witnessed the opening of The Pitman Vegetarian Hotel, home to one of Britain’s first vegetarian restaurants, which reportedly counted Mahatma Gandhi among its customers. 

The tasting menu at Land is a blizzard of deft technique and heady flavours: browned chickpea-flour pancakes are topped with harissa and hot shredded sprouts; roasted onion squash is paired with mustard seeds and curried lentils; an apple dessert is joined by malt mousse and black garlic caramel.

In a city of more than 2,000 restaurants and takeaways, my food wanderings barely scratch the surface. I finish with a visit to The Rainbow pub in Digbeth, where the menu is produced by award-winning vegan specialists Ba-Ha. It’s pub grub — burgers, nachos and salad bowls —