New Falmouth stall serves up a healthy treat
11:00am Saturday 4th August 2012 in News
By Greg Fountain, Reporter/Photographer
Helen Briggs, 24, with her new stall - the "Laughing Lentil" - on the Prince of Wales Pier.
An unusual alternative to the typical fast food fare appeared on Falmouth’s Prince of Wales Pier last week.
The “Laughing Lentil” is the brainchild of Helen Briggs, aged 24, who originally hails from Helston.
Now living in Stithians, Helen commutes to Falmouth daily to serve a variety of Mexican cuisine - ranging from nachos to tacos - all prepared on a handmade cart lovingly crafted by her father, an aircraft engineer at RNAS Culdrose.
She previously worked for a business that catered for special diets and has had stalls at farmer’s markets in the past, so she intends to bring that experience to her new endeavour.
She said: “I wanted something that’s different, because I don’t think enough people are doing Mexican food and I think it’s definitely a growing market.
“Plus it’s really easy to incorporate special diets into Mexican food.”
"There’s not an awful lot of fat in it - certainly not as much as a hot dog or a burger."
Helen Briggs of the "Laughing Lentil"
Vegetarian and vegan options are available at the cart and everything from the Laughing Lentil is gluten free, Helen said.
“I would say it’s a healthy option,” she added. “There’s not an awful lot of fat in it - certainly not as much as a hot dog or a burger.
“The meat I get from the Cornish Pork Pantry, which is rare breed as well as locally sourced.
“People are really interested. I’m trying to get the locals to know I’m here because obviously all the tourists walk past and see me, but the main thing is trying to get locals to know I’m around.”
Helen’s application for street trading consent was fast-tracked by the council, who managed to push it through in a month whereas it can take up to ten weeks.
“They wanted to get me on here for the season,” she said.
“For the summer I wanted to be somewhere where I knew there would be a lot of tourists.
“I definitely wanted to be in Falmouth, I had tried to get on the Moor but all the pitches there were taken so this seemed like the most logical place.”
Looking to the future, Helen hopes to set out her stall at the University campus in September and is happy to be in Falmouth because “it has not been taken over by massive corporations.”
