King’s graduate Mollie Folley, (BA Geography with Social Science and Public Policy, 2019) was invited by King’s Food to re-evaluate the plant-based menus now on offer. Here is her story!
Walking into the second-floor café in the Strand Building in 2018 as a vegan, you would be lucky to purchase the single falafel and hummus wrap in the refrigerator, which looked like it had seen better days. The Waterfront couldn’t offer you much more. Bush House had just opened with several new eateries. While the view from the eighth-floor café was unparalleled, the vegan options were still lacking.
Fast forward to now, as an alum, I was invited back to re-evaluate the plant-based menus. To my delight, I was greeted with Beyond Meat Mondays, which at King's Kitchen meant meat-free lasagne and a fresh side salad on this particular day. Packed with all the brain food a student could wish for, the atmosphere was alive. The queues traveled the length of the room for these plant-based alternatives, which was such a contrast to my time here years before.
Even better is the eighth-floor café which is now wholly vegan. Hot Singapore noodles with gyoza formed the dish of the day with an array of sensational cake and pastries, which prove tricky for a vegan to find even today. These sweet treats extended to the Waterfront and the newly refurbished second floor café in the Strand Building.
Beyond this, every kind of alternative milk was offered, benefiting not only those who choose these options by preference, but also those students who have allergy-related dietary requirements. The coffee has also seen a vast improvement; it was delicious!
Whether grab-and-go or restaurant-style, the new catering strategy has now created a far more equal and inclusive environment and encourages those unfamiliar to try plant-based options. The changes made in the short time since I graduated King’s is exponential, and the rippling wave of benefits will be felt through the students and their attainment for years to come.