Mildreds – Salad Boxes

For the first day of #LastMonthWorkingInSoho lunches I decided to visit Mildreds.

This isn’t technically a ‘new’ lunch location as I’ve been here once before for a lovely sit-down lunch for a colleague’s birthday. However, I’ve never had one of their takeaway salads so it’s sort of ‘new’. I say I’ve never had one of their takeaway salads, but I have been in a few times to have a look before backing out to go find somewhere else less crazy. I find Mildreds intimidating! Before you even get to the food you normally walk through the door to a sea of customers and staff blocking the way – you have to KNOW that you want to get food here as it’s not easy to get a full view of all the food before deciding.

In the window is a lovely display of hot-ish items such as potato tortilla, soup & quiche along with some plastic tubs. Accompanying the display is a small sign saying you must ask a member of staff to serve you. Obviously hot-ish food is a Health & Safety risk! Along the wall leading from the window is a counter with a variety of salads and a throng of people filling their tubs with said salad, but no visible tubs. So obviously I went to pick up a tub from the window at which point someone in an apron pointed to the bar on the other side of the room and said “salad tubs are over there”. I say other side of the room – it’s not that it’s far away, it’s just there’s a very obvious separation of food & bar and it’s not obvious that hot food tubs would be by hot food but salad tubs would be on the bar even though the large tubs were the same size as the hot food tubs.

Anyway, I got my tub and managed to get in between a couple of people to start filling my tub with salad. At this point it still feels intimidating being squished between people whilst staff dash around yelling instructions at each other, but at least it’s a bit more ordered with an obvious progression down the counter of salad bowls towards the till. Luckily the lady that served me at the till was lovely and made up for the earlier telling off I’d received from one of her colleagues.

The salads themselves looked gorgeous and I picked the following for my tub…

Superfoods salad – containing grated beetroot, pumpkin seeds, pomegranate seeds and some form of dried berries. This was very pleasant and a nice balance between the nutty, sweet and earthy flavours.

New potato, tomato & chestnut mushrooms in aioli – the ingredients were pretty much as per the salad description and the mushrooms had been pan fried or roasted so that they had a slight caramelised edge to them. The aioli was nice and light which avoided that cloying feeling you get from a potato salad with too much mayo, however it was also very light on the garlic taste. I know I’m having a lunch whilst at work and I might want to be cautious about garlic breath during meetings, but if I willing choose a salad with aioli then I’d like to taste the garlic please!

Radish, cabbage & carrot slaw with a chilli dressing – again the ingredients were pretty much as per the description. This was a lovely little slaw that tasted like a gentle pickling solution had been used over the shredded vegetables. Once again this was a light salad which left you feeling sated but not bloated, but also once again the flavour of the dressing wasn’t noticeable. If you say there’s a chilli dressing then I want to taste the chilli! Is everyone else a flavour wuss or do I just like my flavours bold?

Roasted vegetable tagliatelle – this looks gorgeous in the bowl with huge chunks of roasted aubergine. Just one problem…. I hate big chunks of aubergine! So I just took some of the pasta, sauce and rocket – which is why the photo doesn’t match the description. The pasta itself was beautifully made (I wondered if they make it fresh) and was a good little boost of carbs on my plate, however I did feel it lacked something and I’d probably not have thought that had I like aubergine and added a couple of pieces to my salad.

• Price – £6.50
• Service & atmosphere – 5/10 (quite brusque)
• Taste – 8/10
• Likelihood to return when back in Soho – Fairly likely

In other news, I should probably define some ‘rules’ for #LastMonthWorkingInSoho