During my Easter tour of Poland I spent a few days in Gdansk.  While I was researching what to do there, a neighbouring town called Sopot came to my attention.  And Sopot, as you can see, has a pier.  I grew up in a little seaside town in the north of England which used to have a pier, until it was cruelly destroyed before I was even born.  One of our neighbouring towns still has a pier and it’s a place I love, so I was really looking forward to breathing some sea air and strolling along a pier once more.

This looks considerably longer than the pier in Saltburn, near where I grew up.  The sea wasn’t any warmer though – the North Sea is always cold, even on a beautiful day like this when we visited Sopot.

The end of the pier is plagued with those infernal love locks (one of my biggest hates of all time), but it’s still a pretty nice place to loiter and look out to sea.  The pier in Sopot is lined with benches, and we had an enjoyable few hours soaking up a few early-April rays and people-watching, before our bellies started grumbling.

I found two good vegan options, and went for Dziupla  (UPDATE: closed May 2017), which is in a lovely little courtyard really close to the pier.  It’s a vegetarian place with English translations on the menu and vegan options marked.  The options included two kinds of soup, nachos, two kinds of cutlets, a risotto and a pasta dish.

Homemade lemonades are our default drinks in this part of the world, and these ones were good and fruity, and made us feel a little more tropical.

On the food front, I went for the broad bean cutlets.  Cutlets pop up a lot on vegan menus in the north of Poland, and when they’re done well, they’re very good.  These were good and crispy outside, with a lovely smooth, creamy texture inside.  They were served as part of a colourful combination:  a wedge of polenta with broccoli, some peas, and a well-dressed salad.  It was a really appealing plate, both visually and in terms of taste.

There were three vegan dessert options:  a chia pudding, strawberry millet cake and a tofurnik cake.  I went for the latter, which was a chocolate cheesecake.  Oh, it was good!  It was rich and creamy, and had a few tart berries in it.  The base was almost flapjacky, and it was topped with crunchy almonds.  I loved it!

Sopot is a great place to visit if you’re in that neck of the woods.  We were so lucky that we went on the best day of the holiday, weather-wise:  there’s probably not quite so much to fill your time if you can’t bask in the sunshine.

(UPDATE: Dziupla closed May 2017)