Vegan ice cream, that is — made with coconut milk and agave instead of dairy/soy and sugar! That’s right, kids, I’m a slave to the prepackaged goodness. So I’ve made my valiant SuperVegan return — the free samples, they beckoned.
Now if only we had an actual summertime in this good-for-nothing foggery…
Danielle Konya’s Bethlehem, Pennsylvania baked-good operation Vegan Treats gets an incredibly glowing little write-up in yesterday’s Washington Post. “The award-winning bombe, also tofu-based, features subtly flavored peanut butter mousse and is coated with a killer Belgian-chocolate shell.”
As the WaPo points out, Vegan Treats do look really amazing (note to self: buy a pastry bag instead of using repurposed [clean!] plastic bags). This is probably why Atlas is always able to pass off last week’s slices as new ones to unsuspecting customers.
But: there is no mention of the cakes’ trans fats. Unless Konya has changed her recipes, these things aren’t gonna be street legal in New York City in two weeks (and I guess D.C. will be getting the surplus). So eat up, kids!
They’re overplayed (to say the least), but cupcakes are still fun to eat, fun to draw, and definitely fun to write about… within reason. So I think I’m going to start honing my craft with another baked good (with exception, of course, for almond-wasabi cakes).
I archived the radio documentaries I worked on at Columbia in this handy hip muxtape format in hopes of landing a job at KQED. Please only leave very positive comments about my comedic timing and ability to write short declarative sentences on the off chance that they see this blog post.
Sorry, folks, I’ve just been distracted by other pursuits. But I’ll be back very shortly with tales of transcontinental air transit, kitchen-related injuries by way of indulgent desserts, New York art shows, sketchbook follies and general hard-knock stories about being a Crown Heights, Brooklyn freelancing shut-in. See, so much to come! For now, though, I’ll leave you with these gooey tiramisu cupcakes from VCTOW.
Growing up in the San Fernando Valley (like omg) my family ate at restaurants or got take out nearly every night of the week. I chalk this up to my parents’ extremely busy schedules, plus their New York nostalgia. And now that I live in NYC, it’s very easy to do the same (especially with a Vegetarian Palate that delivers so promptly). However, these factors have not only put a large dent in my little wallet, but have also made me a relatively incompetent cook. Lately I’ve been making strides to remedy this. These cookies are the sad victims of my learning process.
This cookie recipe was taken (and subsequently mutilated) from the Vegan Family Cookbook.
Ingredients:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
1. Mix the flour + egg replacer + baking soda + salt in one bowl.
2. Mix the sugar + margarine + water + vanilla in another bowl.
3. Mix the bowl contents together.
4. Do not be alarmed that the dough is not really sticking together – just add tablespoons of water until it becomes one big creamy clump.
5. Now add way too many chocolate chunks.
6. And way too many chopped walnuts.
7. Spoon large clumps onto a nonstick cookie sheet. The VFC recipe makes 24, but this makes only a lucky 13, because the clumps are so damn big!
8. Bake for about 15 minutes or until they become nicely tanned. Do not be alarmed that the clusterfucks do not spread like normal cookies. This is to be expected.
And: Do not be alarmed that the clusterfucks look kind of gross — they taste awesome!
So even though I went to the city yesterday for cake day at Atlas (cancelled! no new cake!) and some sweet action at Dick Blick (where I am now a “preferred customer” via my expired Columbia ID), today I really truly had to pick up a new brush at the Pratt store (where I also discovered aluminum clamp lights, “plum” twintip Sharpies and a Tria brushpen six pack on clearance… I swear, that place will be the ugly, premature death of my “independent wealth.”)
I continued my walk down Myrtle, then along Washington down to DeKalb. I was planning to get a late lunch at the excellent Pequena, but instead opted for a simple iced coffee at Tillie’s. I hadn’t yet been to Tillie’s, which I’d read about as “continuing the writerly tradition of Fort Greene” or something equally presumptuous and pretentious. Now here in the story it should be noted that I was wearing my massive sunglasses, the ones I wear when I care not to be fucked with, and the ones I usually do not wear when exploring new places, as they more or less make me blind. 
So I did not notice until I was halfway through the door that I had not, as I’d previously suspected, stepped over a very rotund dark gray dog on my way in. No, no - I had, in fact, stepped over a very rotund dark gray pot-bellied pig. On a leash. Just when I noticed, an older man walked by and remarked loudly, “Damn, that’s nasty.” I presume he was talking about the pig and not its petite blonde owner, who was quite a nice-looking woman.
So despite my surprise, this is apparently not entirely uncommon, though nothing compared to the “pot-bellied pig craze” of the late ’80s and early ’90s, when pigs were selling for $800 to $1,000. But I guess that was before my time.