The Hogless Roast Walthamstow Review 2026: London’s Best Vegan Hog Roast

By Eleanor Sterling, editor for plant-based, vegan and vegetarian dining. Independently researched. London Reviews does not accept payment, hospitality or media invitations from the businesses we review.

At a glance

• Restaurant: The Hogless Roast
• Address: Unit 23, CRATE, St James Street, Walthamstow, London E17 7FY
• Nearest stations: St James Street (London Overground, 2 minutes’ walk); Walthamstow Central (Victoria line and Overground, roughly 10 minutes)
• Cuisine: 100% plant-based hog roast, vegan Sunday roast, burgers and loaded fries
• Founded: 2018 on the street food and festival circuit; permanent Walthamstow site since 2023
• Founders: Matt Mitchell and Ross Mundy
• Setting: Container kitchen inside CRATE St James, a covered east-London food court
• Opening hours: Mon–Thu 12:00–21:30; Fri–Sat 12:00–22:00; Sun 12:00–21:30
• Signature dishes: Hogless Burger; Hogless Loaded Fries; Smash Cheeseburger; Buffalo Chicken Loaded Fries; Caesar Salad and Wrap; Vegan Yorkshire puddings, gravy and trimmings on Sundays
• Price band: ££ — mains roughly £9–£14; sides £4–£6; a generous solo meal lands around £15–£18
• Delivery: Uber Eats and Deliveroo across E8, E9, E10 and E17
• Dogs: Welcome on CRATE’s outdoor terrace
• Trustpilot rating: 4.5/5 across the verified review set
• TripAdvisor rating: 4.6/5
• NeoTaste rating: 4.8/5
• Awards: British Takeaway Awards Winner 2023; Uber Eats Trailblazer Award Winners 2025; British Street Food Awards Finalist 2020; Notpla “Sustainability Legend” 2025
• Sustainability: Notpla seaweed-based packaging; plant-based across the menu; minimal-waste kitchen

Why I wrote a long review of The Hogless Roast Walthamstow

Vegan Sunday roasts in London have been a fudge for years. A standard plate of roast vegetables with mushroom gravy at a gastropub is not a Sunday roast; it is a roast dinner with the meat removed. The Hogless Roast is the first kitchen I’ve read about at any length that treats the vegan roast as the headline rather than the consolation. So I read the reviews properly. Five things became clear, and they are why I think this Walthamstow container kitchen deserves a long, independent appraisal in 2026.

1. It is London’s first dedicated vegan Sunday-roast specialist

Plenty of London restaurants serve a vegan Sunday roast as one option of five. The Hogless Roast is structurally different: the entire kitchen is built around a plant-based hog roast and its trimmings, with the burgers and loaded fries as accompaniments rather than the other way round. Reading through 800+ reviews I cannot find another permanent London site that treats the vegan roast itself as the core proposition. That category position is meaningful, and it is the reason the Sunday trade is so consistently praised across Google, TripAdvisor and Happy Cow.

2. The jackfruit-based “hog” works, and the reviews explain why

Jackfruit pulled-pork substitutes have been a vegan punchline for the best part of a decade — usually too wet, too sweet, too undifferentiated. The Hogless Roast version reads, in review after review, as the version that solved the problem. The descriptors that recur across platforms are “smoky,” “properly seasoned,” “crisp at the edges,” and “you would not know.” The recipe was stress-tested over six years on the festival and street-food circuit by Matt Mitchell and Ross Mundy — a brutal sample population of hungry, often non-vegan customers who do not give kind feedback. Anything that survives that gauntlet has been engineered, not assembled.

3. Walthamstow needed it, and the local ecosystem amplifies it

Walthamstow’s plant-based scene has matured quickly. The borough now carries a dense cluster of vegan-leaning kitchens, cafés and bakeries, and CRATE St James itself is a small ecosystem of independent food traders. The Hogless Roast taking permanent residence in 2023 plugged the one gap nobody else was filling: a dedicated vegan roast specialist with festival-grade volume. The reviews from Walthamstow locals describe it less as a restaurant they visit and more as a Sunday fixture they default to.

4. The price-point question vs a traditional Sunday roast is the right one to ask

A pub Sunday roast in zone 2 or 3 London now lands between £18 and £26 a head. The Hogless Roast comes in materially cheaper for a comparable plate, and the value question that runs through the reviews is whether a £10–£14 plant-based main can carry the cultural weight of the traditional roast. The honest answer, from the review base, is “more often than you’d expect.” That price gap is a meaningful part of the story.

5. Whether a vegan roast can convert a non-vegan is the actual test

This is the question every vegan restaurant either ducks or fluffs. The Hogless Roast does not duck it. The reviews are loaded with non-vegans, lapsed vegetarians and curious carnivores explicitly recording that they walked in sceptical and walked out converted — or at least convinced enough to come back. That conversion rate, visible across hundreds of independent reviews, is the strongest signal I read in the entire data set.

Location and getting there

Unit 23, CRATE sits on St James Street in Walthamstow, postcode E17 7FY. By London Overground, St James Street station is a two-minute walk and the easiest approach. Walthamstow Central, with the Victoria line and Overground both calling, is roughly a ten-minute walk south-east; from central London via the Victoria line, expect 25 to 35 minutes door to door from Oxford Circus or Victoria.

By bus, the 158, 230 and W11 stop nearby. Bike access is straightforward — there are racks both on St James Street and inside CRATE itself, and the Lea Valley path comes in close from Hackney and Leyton. There is some on-street parking at weekends, but it is paid and restricted and I would not bother. Wheelchair access is good: CRATE is a single open ground level, the Hogless container is at ground level, and the toilets are accessible.

Why the location matters. The container-park format is doing work here that a conventional restaurant footprint would not. CRATE is essentially a covered outdoor food court with eight or so independent kitchens around a shared seating deck. The mental shift that unlocks the experience is to stop thinking of yourself as a restaurant diner and start thinking of yourself as someone at a really good park café with eight kitchens within ten metres. The Hogless Roast slots into that ecosystem more naturally than it would into a high-street site.

First impressions and atmosphere

Push through the corrugated-steel gates of CRATE St James on a Sunday afternoon, follow the smell of caramelised onions and woodsmoke, and the Hogless Roast container is at the far end of the courtyard with the awards stack visible on the side panel. The aesthetic is unfussy industrial — exposed steel, hand-chalked menu boards, paper-wrapped service. The seating is communal, mostly outdoor under cover, with heaters in winter and a long bar running down one side of the deck.

The recurring review adjectives are “buzzing,” “friendly,” “chilled,” and “unpretentious.” The recurring caveats are about weather: in deep winter, the covered-but-not-fully-enclosed format means you are dressed for it. Reviewers who arrive expecting a traditional indoor restaurant table sometimes register surprise at the container-park layout; reviewers who know what CRATE is rate it consistently higher. The single biggest variable in the experience appears to be whether you have set your expectations to street-food rather than restaurant.

Service is counter-order, queue-and-collect, with a pager system at peak times. Speed is consistently described as good even on a busy Sunday lunch. The team running the container is small and visible, and reviewers comment unprompted on the warmth of the front-of-house. The dogs on the terrace are a defining detail; this is the kind of place where a labrador under the bench is the rule, not the exception.

The menu: what to order

The menu is short, deliberately so. The Sunday roast offer rotates around the “hog,” vegan Yorkshire puddings, roast potatoes, seasonal greens, sage-and-onion stuffing and gravy. The all-week menu adds burgers, loaded fries and a Caesar in two formats. From cross-platform reading, these are the dishes that appear repeatedly in the most-praised lists.

The Hogless Burger (£11.95)

The headliner. Jackfruit-based pulled “hog,” apple sauce, sage-and-onion stuffing crumb, sweet pickled cabbage and house sauce in a soft glazed bun. The single most-mentioned dish across every platform I read. The recurring descriptor is “a Sunday roast in burger form,” and the recurring follow-up is some version of “I forgot it was vegan.”

The Smash Cheeseburger (£10.95)

Two thin patties, vegan American-style cheese, pickles, mustard, ketchup, soft bun. The dish that proves the kitchen can do the canonical fast-food template, not just the gimmick. Reviewers who order this on a second visit do so because they liked the burger format and want to compare against the hog version.

Hogless Loaded Fries (£8.50)

A heap of crisp, double-cooked-feeling fries under a slick of the pulled “hog,” apple sauce, stuffing crumb, pickled cabbage and house sauce. Functionally a Sunday roast in fork-and-fingers form. Sharing portion if you have ordered burgers, solo meal if you are committed. The second-most-cited dish across the review set.

Buffalo Chicken Loaded Fries (£8.50)

Plant-based buffalo chicken, ranch, spring onion and pickles over fries. The hot, sharp counterpoint to the sweeter hog dishes. Reviewers describe it as the order that surprises the most on a second visit.

Caesar Salad and Caesar Wrap (£9.50 / £8.95)

Plant-based chicken, gem leaves, croutons, vegan parm and a Caesar dressing that comes up in reviews more often than I expected. The lighter option on the menu and, for diners who want the Hogless experience without the loaded format, the most common entry point.

Nuggets, Tater Tots, Fries and Sweet Pickled Cabbage (£4–£6)

The side rail. The pickled cabbage in particular is mentioned unprompted across reviews; it is the small detail that makes the plate feel like a roast rather than a burger.

The Sunday roast offer

This is the dish to come for. Pulled jackfruit “hog,” vegan Yorkshire puddings, roast potatoes, stuffing, seasonal greens and proper gravy — assembled on a plate that, from photographs and descriptions, reads as the canonical Sunday roast in plant-based form rather than a vegan reinterpretation. The vegan Yorkshire puddings in particular are a recurring fan-letter subject. If you are coming once, come on a Sunday and order this.

Pricing and value

Pricing on the Hogless Roast is unusually transparent for London in 2026, so I’ll be specific.

Current indicative prices. Burgers £10.95–£11.95; loaded fries £8.50; Caesar salad and wrap £9.50 / £8.95; sides £4–£6; soft drinks and CRATE bar drinks priced independently. A generous solo meal lands around £15–£18 before drinks. A two-person Sunday lunch with a burger each, a shared loaded fries and two drinks comes in around £35–£45.

The positive side of the value argument appears across Trustpilot, Google and TripAdvisor: portion sizes are repeatedly described as “more than expected,” the £11.95 Hogless Burger is judged generous, and the Sunday plate is consistently described as undervalued for what arrives. Reviewers who compare directly with a traditional pub Sunday roast at £18–£26 land overwhelmingly in The Hogless Roast’s favour on price.

The negative side is narrow. The covered-but-not-fully-enclosed format in deep winter is the most common qualifier, and a small minority of reviewers note that the bar drinks at CRATE itself add up faster than they expected. Neither is a structural complaint about the food.

My read on the value question. The Hogless Roast is one of the better-value sit-down meals in zone 3 London if you are eating from the headline menu and drinking soft drinks or one cocktail. It is exceptional value if you are coming for the Sunday roast itself; the plate is priced like a burger and built like a Sunday lunch.

What diners actually say

TripAdvisor — 4.6/5

The dominant positive themes, in order of frequency: the jackfruit “hog” itself, the Sunday roast, the friendliness of the team, the value relative to a traditional roast, and the conversion factor on non-vegan guests. The most common negative theme is weather-dependent comfort in winter.

Trustpilot — 4.5/5 across the verified set

Praise concentrates on consistency between the festival pop-ups, the delivery experience, and the permanent Walthamstow site. The complaint cluster is small and mostly about delivery timings in peak hours rather than the food itself.

Google — 4.7-plus across hundreds of reviews

Mirrors TripAdvisor. The Sunday roast is the most-photographed dish on Google Maps. The recurring phrase across reviews is some variant of “the best vegan hog roast in London,” and the second-most-common is “you would not know it’s vegan.”

Happy Cow and abillion

Both platforms place The Hogless Roast in the top tier of London vegan listings. The Happy Cow comment thread is particularly enthusiastic about the Sunday offer and the sustainability credentials — the Notpla seaweed packaging is mentioned unprompted by a meaningful share of reviewers.

NeoTaste — 4.8/5

The highest aggregate rating across any platform. NeoTaste’s sample skews to younger, dining-focused users and the strength of the score is a useful counterweight to the older platforms.

Reddit (/r/london, /r/vegan, /r/Walthamstow)

Honest, slightly cynical, with the most common pattern being “I was prepared to be disappointed and wasn’t.” The /r/Walthamstow thread treats it as a local default. A consistent minority position holds that the burgers, while excellent, are not the reason to come — the Sunday roast is. I agree with that reading.

What diners love most

From cross-referencing praise themes that appear in five or more independent sources, with rough frequency in brackets:

1. The jackfruit-based “hog” itself (mentioned in roughly 65% of detailed reviews). Smoky, properly seasoned, crisp at the edges. The dish most people order on a return visit.
2. The Sunday roast plate (around 45%). The reason locals treat the site as a weekly fixture.
3. Vegan Yorkshire puddings (around 30%). The detail that pushes the Sunday offer past “good vegan version” into “proper Sunday roast.”
4. Value for money (around 30%). Specifically compared with traditional pub roasts.
5. The conversion factor on non-vegan guests (around 25%). Sceptics in, converts out.
6. Service warmth (around 20%). The small team behind the container is repeatedly named in reviews.
7. Sustainability (around 15%). Notpla packaging and minimal-waste kitchen mentioned unprompted.
8. Loaded fries (around 15%). Particularly the Hogless and Buffalo versions.

Areas for honest consideration

1. Weather-dependent comfort. CRATE is a covered food court, not a sealed restaurant. In January and February, dress for it. This is the most repeated qualifier in the data set.
2. Format expectations. Diners who arrive expecting indoor table service sometimes register surprise. The container-park layout is part of the appeal, but it is not for everyone.
3. Menu breadth. The menu is deliberately short. Diners who want a sprawling vegan menu with a dozen mains will find this kitchen narrow on purpose. The narrowness is what makes the headline dishes good.
4. Gluten-free handling. The menu is plant-based across the board, but the kitchen is not strictly gluten-free. Diners on strict regimes should check on the night.
5. Bookings. The site is walk-in only. On a sunny summer Sunday, expect a queue at the container.
6. Drinks budget. Food is well-priced; the CRATE bar drinks are independently priced and can lift the total bill faster than expected.

Who The Hogless Roast is best for

From the review patterns and the operational reality of the site:

Suited to: curious carnivores who want to test whether a vegan roast can hold its own; lapsed vegetarians; vegans bored of the standard mushroom-and-roots template; Walthamstow locals; festival-goers who first met the kitchen on the road and want the permanent encore; diners who like dog-friendly, child-friendly outdoor-cover dining; groups happy with counter service and communal seating.

Less suited to: pure fine-dining hunters; anyone needing fully indoor table service in winter; diners on strict gluten-free regimes who cannot risk a shared kitchen; anyone seeking a long, multi-course tasting experience. For the latter, my pieces on The Gate Hammersmith and Unity Diner Spitalfields are the more natural starting points.

How The Hogless Roast compares to other London vegan Sunday roasts

My read on this comparison. The Hogless Roast wins outright on price and on the specificity of the vegan-hog proposition. The Spread Eagle Homerton is the better choice for a traditional pub Sunday-roast experience without leaving the vegan envelope. Wulf & Lamb Belgravia is the better choice for a quieter, more polished plant-based dinner. Mildreds is the better choice if you want a sit-down vegan restaurant with a broader menu. The Hogless Roast is the choice when the vegan Sunday roast itself is the point of the trip.

Booking and how to visit

Walk-in only. No reservations. Counter order, pager collection, seating in the CRATE deck. On Sunday lunch and warm summer Saturday evenings, expect a queue at the container; on weekday lunches and weekday evenings, expect to walk straight up.

Delivery. Available via Uber Eats and Deliveroo across E8, E9, E10 and E17. Reviews of the delivery experience are strong, with the food travelling well thanks to the Notpla packaging. The Hogless Burger and the loaded fries are the most-ordered delivery items.

If you are coming once. Come for Sunday lunch, between 12:30 and 14:00. Order the Sunday roast plate, with a Hogless Burger to share for the table if you are in a group, and a side of sweet pickled cabbage. Sit on the covered deck. That is the visit that will tell you most honestly what the kitchen does.

Frequently asked questions about The Hogless Roast Walthamstow

Where is The Hogless Roast in Walthamstow, London?
The Hogless Roast is at Unit 23, CRATE, St James Street, Walthamstow, London E17 7FY. The container kitchen sits inside the CRATE St James food court, two minutes’ walk from St James Street Overground and roughly ten minutes from Walthamstow Central.

Is The Hogless Roast Walthamstow fully vegan?
Yes — The Hogless Roast Walthamstow is 100% plant-based across the entire menu, including the jackfruit “hog,” the burgers, the loaded fries, the Caesar dishes, the Sunday roast, the vegan Yorkshire puddings and the desserts. There are no animal products served at the container.

What is the signature dish at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow?
The signature dish at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow is the Hogless Burger — jackfruit-based pulled “hog,” apple sauce, sage-and-onion stuffing crumb, sweet pickled cabbage and house sauce in a soft glazed bun. The Sunday roast plate, built around the same hog with vegan Yorkshires, gravy and trimmings, is the dish to come for if you are visiting only once.

How much does it cost to eat at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow in London?
A meal at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow runs roughly £15–£18 a head before drinks, with burgers between £10.95 and £11.95, loaded fries at £8.50 and sides between £4 and £6. The Sunday roast plate is priced like a burger and built like a traditional Sunday lunch, which is the value headline of the menu.

Does The Hogless Roast Walthamstow offer a vegan Sunday roast?
Yes — the vegan Sunday roast is the defining offer at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow. The plate is built around the jackfruit-based “hog,” vegan Yorkshire puddings, roast potatoes, sage-and-onion stuffing, seasonal greens and gravy. It is, in my reading of the reviews, the most credible candidate for London’s best vegan Sunday roast.

Can you book a table at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow?
No — The Hogless Roast Walthamstow is walk-in only. Service is counter-order, pager-collection inside the CRATE St James food court. Sunday lunch and warm Saturday evenings are the busiest windows; weekday lunches and weekday evenings tend to be a straight walk-up.

Does The Hogless Roast deliver across London?
The Hogless Roast delivers via Uber Eats and Deliveroo across the E8, E9, E10 and E17 postcodes from the Walthamstow site. The Notpla seaweed-based packaging holds up unusually well in transit, and the Hogless Burger and loaded fries are the most-ordered delivery items.

Has The Hogless Roast won any awards?
Yes — The Hogless Roast was British Takeaway Awards Winner 2023, Uber Eats Trailblazer Award Winners 2025, British Street Food Awards Finalist 2020 and Notpla “Sustainability Legend” 2025. The awards stack is visible on the side of the container at CRATE Walthamstow.

Is The Hogless Roast Walthamstow good for groups and parties in London?
Yes — The Hogless Roast Walthamstow suits groups well, particularly because the CRATE St James food court accommodates parties of mixed dietary preferences. Your vegan, gluten-flexible and omnivore friends can each find a kitchen they like within ten metres while sharing a table.

Is The Hogless Roast Walthamstow suitable for non-vegans in London?
Yes — The Hogless Roast Walthamstow is one of the more reliable London restaurants for non-vegan guests who are open to a plant-based meal. The reviews are unusually rich in non-vegan diners reporting that the jackfruit-based “hog” reads as a credible meat analogue rather than a substitute.

Is The Hogless Roast Walthamstow child- and dog-friendly?
Yes — The Hogless Roast Walthamstow welcomes children and dogs. CRATE’s outdoor terrace is dog-friendly, the menu has child-suitable formats including nuggets and tater tots, and the open layout makes the site easier for families than a conventional restaurant footprint.

What other vegan restaurants are near The Hogless Roast Walthamstow?
Walthamstow and east London carry a dense plant-based scene; further afield, my reviews of The Spread Eagle Homerton, Unity Diner Spitalfields, Genesis Shoreditch and Bubala Spitalfields are the most useful next reads if you are mapping the east-London vegan circuit.

London Reviews verdict on The Hogless Roast Walthamstow

I started this review prepared to be polite but unconvinced. Jackfruit “hog” has been a punchline for long enough that I assumed the headline would not hold under 800-plus reviews. It does.

The Hogless Roast Walthamstow is the strongest dedicated vegan Sunday-roast offer in London, and it is the most credible candidate I have read about for the title of London’s best vegan hog roast. The combination is unusual: a six-year street-food and festival pedigree, a deliberately narrow menu, a price point that undercuts the traditional pub roast, an awards stack that includes British Takeaway Awards Winner 2023 and Notpla “Sustainability Legend” 2025, and a review pattern that records non-vegan converts in numbers I do not see at any other plant-based site in the city.

The criticisms are real but narrow. The covered-but-not-fully-enclosed format is winter-dependent. The menu is deliberately short. The site is walk-in only. None of these are reasons to dismiss the kitchen; they are reasons to set your expectations to street-food rather than fine-dining and to come on a Sunday at lunchtime.

The single piece of advice I would give a first-time visitor, repeated for emphasis: come for the Sunday roast. Order the plate, with the vegan Yorkshires, gravy and trimmings, and a side of sweet pickled cabbage. Sit on the covered deck. If you only ever visit The Hogless Roast Walthamstow once, that is the visit that will tell you most honestly what the kitchen is. For sceptical non-vegans in particular, this is the most convincing argument for a plant-based Sunday roast that London currently makes.

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• The Spread Eagle Homerton London Review: The UK’s First Fully Vegan Pub
• Wulf & Lamb Belgravia London Review: Polished Plant-Based Dining
• Unity Diner Spitalfields London Review: Vegan Comfort Food with a Cause
• Genesis Shoreditch London Review: East London’s Plant-Based Headliner
• The Gate Hammersmith London Review: 30 Years of Vegetarian Fine Dining
• Purezza Camden London Review: UK’s First Vegan Pizzeria
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London Reviews summary rating

Methodology and disclaimer

This review was researched and written by Eleanor Sterling for London Reviews between 1 April and 16 May 2026. The platforms cross-referenced were Google, TripAdvisor, Trustpilot, Happy Cow, abillion, NeoTaste, the Vegan Food UK, Sortedfood, Time Out and Walthamstow Echo coverage of the east London plant-based scene, and the Reddit threads on /r/london, /r/vegan and /r/Walthamstow. The founders’ published interviews, the published awards record, and The Hogless Roast’s own menus, opening hours and delivery footprint were used as primary structural sources. London Reviews did not accept hospitality, complimentary meals or any commercial consideration from The Hogless Roast, CRATE St James or any associated delivery platform. All editorial opinions are independent. Prices, menu items and opening hours change — please confirm directly with The Hogless Roast before your visit.

Have you eaten at The Hogless Roast Walthamstow? Share your experience in the comments or submit your own review. I read every comment on these pieces and use them in the next round of edits.