River Green has been serving Norwich since 2011. We’ve always been about trying to serve good food without causing harm to: Animals, people or the environment. The style has been casual, the menu inspired by dishes and cuisines from all around the world. We have enjoyed serving our food to lots of lovely people: Some vegans, many vegetarians, and a number of dyed-in-the-wool meat-eaters too! The kitchen at River Green is occupied by former designer turned qualified chef, Chris Avey, who joined in 2015, taking on the whole business in 2017.

 

We’ve been on a journey both personally, and as a business, especially since the pandemic, and subsequent trials; Our menu is now completely plant based because we believe it’s best for the whole planet. We have enjoyed developing these dishes, and using new ingredients… We were the first in Norwich to create a ‘Banana Blossom ‘ish and chips!’ We also became ‘Proudly Norfolk!’ (A member since 2017.) Our entire menu (with options) is safe for, and recommended by, coeliac disease sufferers. We have been recognised, in regional and national awards, reviews, and even with silver medals in the Craft Guild of Chef's International Salon Culinaire 2021 and 2022.

 

Now we’ve taken a further step forward: Seasonal ingredients, but we’re willing to change the menu weekly or even daily to achieve that. Yes, flavours from around the world, but adapting them, re-imagining each dish with ingredients from as near to home as possible, reducing our carbon footprint and being sure of the provenance of those products. We’ll take each dish apart and consider all its elements separately, mixing and matching to evolve each flavour, knowing that for every dish, there are as many recipes as cooks that make it!

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We’re not slavishly devoted to only local products… There are iconic flavours that we don’t produce nearby: Pomegranate, galangal, coconut, classic vinegars, to name but some. We need them too, and we’ll admit that there are good ingredients to be found outside of Norfolk! So we’ll prefer local over exotic, Rapeseed over olive oils, mushroom instead of miso, and source our quinoa and tofu, etc. from British growers and makers. Yes, we had fun with banana blossom and jackfruit, but do we always need to import these goods from halfway around the world during a climate crisis? Maybe not ‘never,’ but certainly not always, it’s time for a rethink...

 

With a permanently smaller dining room, and fewer staff, it’s about honesty: to the produce, the dish, the product and the customer, and passion about everything on your plate, cooking the food we believe in; nothing just for looks, or because it’s ‘traditional,’ ‘authentic,’ or even (heaven forbid,) fashionable!

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