Sydney's Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale or: Our Vegan Community is AWESOME!

Yesterday we had our stall to participate in the first ever Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale! We organised to meet at the Newtown DIY Markets at the bright and early time of 6.30am and thankfully the several trips from the van to our spot kept me warm!

We chose a spot under a tree on one side of the markets and we were all set up by 8am. It was a little overcast and chilly but thankfully it wasn't raining.

Here's a closer look at our awesome banner that my best friend Rach made for us!

To start we with we had what we'd spent a good couple of hours baking. Leigh made choc chip, double choc chip and mocha choc chip biccies (wheat ones and gluten free ones) and chocolate,

passionfruit and vanilla melting momtents (again gluten free and non-gluten free).

Drossolalia made a batch of super cute mini lemon and vanilla cupcakes with vanilla and raspberry icing as well as regular sized vanilla cupcakes with raspberry icing. And her Mum made us panforte bars which was very popular (I also forgot to take a photo of it)

I made gluten free carrot cake cupcakes topped with lemony icing and a mini marzipan carrots, gluten free banana split cupcakes with melted chocolate and 100s and 1000s on top, cookies n cream cupcakes as well as gluten free gingerbread vegans.

We had two small sales just after 8am and I remember wondering how well we were going to do but as the morning went on we started to have more and more people arriving. Our friend Sarah was one of the first to arrive, on her way to work she biked over and delivered a loaf of banana bread.

Soon after that our friend Kate.M arrived with some GIANT choc chip cookies!

I'd had a lot of offers from Sydney vegans via email and I got to meet a lot of them yesterday. Mel and her boyfriend Lee came by early and dropped off a zingy lemon tart with a spelt and almond base.

Renee made coconut dream cupcakes and dropped those off for us to sell.

Mandie made a fantastic looking assortment of mini cupcakes including lemon with rosewater icing and chocolate macadamia. As well as chocolate cake slices and date balls.

Christie made us a chocolate topped anzac slice (another one I forgot to take a photo of but I bought a piece so there's a pic below)

Later on Zarah showed up with some choc chip walnut biccies and we met her lovely friend Div who also made a purchase.

Jamie bought us a raw tahini carob slice which was popular with people that asked for items that were sugar-free.

Celia dropped off some tangy orange shortbread after staying up late just so she could bake something for us!

Natalie dropped off a white chocolate mud cake that didn't last long on the table.

I also got to meet Kate.S and her friend, both made large purchases. Kate's running a vegan cooking workshop at the East Fairfield Community Centre, if you're in the area, make sure you check it out.

By now we were starting to run out and our table was looking bare.

Then Tish dropped off some raspberry tarts and a zucchini cake just as we were off to get some Burger Fuel for lunch so thanks to Mel for these 2 photos

By 1.30pm we'd sold out of everything and as we starting packing up we had a few more customers come over only to be told the bad news. We were amazed at how much we'd sold as we'd originally been trying to think of what we would do with all the left overs!

We went back to Leigh's place (a very handy 1 minute walk from the markets) to count the money and we made $908.70!!! We were shocked and very happy with the result. Our money will be going to WSPA and I can't wait to make the donation tomorrow :)

I took home an assortment of goodies to try with Chris, he loved the lemon tart and I loved the choc anzac slice and the coconut cupcake.

We had a fantastic day, I'm happy the rain held off, and that we had so many awesome vegans drop by to support a good cause to help raise so much money.

I spoke to a few vegans who either didn't know about our facebook group or had joined and then never looked at it again. They were happy to hear about our meet ups and I am sure we'll be seeing them at the next one we organise :)

And now for the thanks yous. Thanks to Gary who came up with the awesome idea of the Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale. Thanks to Leigh and drossolalia for helping to make our stall happen including carrying stuff to/from the van. Thanks to Rachele for making our fantastic banner. Thanks to Chris for helping me plan, borrowing his parents' table and for taste-testing. Thanks to Sarah, Renee, Mandie, Christie, Zarah, Jamie, Celia, Natalie, Tish and drossolalia's Mum for baking delicious vegan goodies for the stall. Thanks to Kate.M for baking and helping out with the stall. Thanks to Mel for baking, coming back to help run the stall and for you and Lee helping me carry stuff back to the van at the end of the day. Thanks to Leigh's friend who also helped me carry the table back to the van. Thanks to Charles at Naked Espresso for the round of coffees. Thanks to my Mum and Dad for coming down and for letting me borrow our work van and to everyone who dropped by, made a purchase and contributed to the amount of money we raised!

We are thinking of doing it again this year. I would love to hear from anybody who made a purchase to get your feedback and from anyone who would like to be involved with baking for the stall.

I hope the rest of the bake sales around the world have as fantastic a day as we did :)

My Mini Garden

My balcony was looking a bit bare so about a month ago I decided it was time to start a mini balcony garden.

I bought some veggies including broccoli, cauliflower, snow peas and roly poly carrots as well as some strawberries.

Within a week I noticed the broccoli and cauliflower were covered in tiny grey mites, agh!

I read online that some good plants to deter insects are thyme and nasturtium, so I planted seeds of both of those, around the broccoli and cauliflower. They're now growing, it's fun to watch them get taller and taller. I hope they work!

Here are some nasturtiums I planted in the pot of the Sad Plant. I don't know what type of plant Sad Plant is, but I've had it since I moved into my first apartment and it was left behind the person who lived there before I did. A new baby Sad Plant is now growing at the base.

About two weeks ago I went out to water my veggies and a little snail came out from under the broccoli and I watched him/her for about 10 mins as he/she crawled over the broccoli leaves and then out of the pot. I also noticed the leaves looked chewed on and then found a bright green caterpillar. I moved the pot of snow peas & carrot further away and I don't think I'll be eating the broccoli and cauliflower, they're looking ill and discoloured as the number of mites has increased.

The snow peas have been growing well and I have picked a few, they are crispy and sweet and I have also picked out one roly poly carrot, they're so small and cute.

At our local markets I bought a chilli plant and I look forward to using them in my cooking and I've also planted some calendula that will eventually add some more colour to my mini garden.

The markets are located in Frenchs Forest in the carpark of the Parkway Hotel. There are lots of (non-vegan) food stalls plus lots of people selling fruit and veg, bread, clothes and jewellery.

I was really excited when I saw a stall with a banner for Addiction Food because I noticed the words vegan and gluten free. I talked to the couple at the stall and they had three vegan options including a fig, apple and walnut slice and a bliss ball so I bought one of each. They had plans to have their vegan goods sold in Funky Pies and they are now being sold by them. I liked the flavour of the fig, apple and walnut slice.

We carried on walking around the market and a few stalls later I saw another stall with vegan and gluten free baked goods! The Laughing Planet bakes with whole grains and no refined sugar but not everything is vegan. I bought a chocolate zucchini cupcake and some raw fudge. We also went back last weekend and I purchased the ginger fudge and a chocolate mini muffin. The cupcake was very cocoa-y, as was the mini muffin. Out of the fudges, I liked the ginger the best.

The Frenchs Forest Organic Market is located at 5 Frenchs Forest Rd East, Frenchs Forest.

Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale - Update!

We've been organising our Sydney bake sale as part of the Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale and we've decided that all the money raised will be going to WSPA, we'll have some of their brochures and stickers to give away on the day.

I've had a few emails and phone calls from Sydney vegans, offering to bake something for us to sell or to help out on the day. If you aren't able to bake something for the stall we would love for you to come down on the day and purchase some of the delicious goods we'll have for sale and support a good cause at the same time!

Keep an eye out for our posters, I've put them up in Newtown at Naked Espresso and Vegan's Choice and in Bondi at Laurie's, Funky Pies and Iku.

Here's the original, using the WVBS choc chip biscuit logo:

And our new poster, using a cute lil cupcake with the vegan V on top!
We have just under two weeks to go, eek! I really hope we have a sunny day, cross your fingers everyone :)

Vegan Yum Cha

It's been too long between blogs for me but I have plenty o' spare time today because it's a public holiday, woo!

2 weeks ago our vegan group got together for yum cha at Newtown's Green Gourmet. I was really looking forward to yum cha because a. I'd never had yum cha before (vegan or pregan) and I'd never eaten at Green Gourmet. I took a lot of photos though I might have some of the names wrong, but enjoy visual yum cha:

Our first dish was rice paper rolls flled with rice noodles and veggies.

Kumera Ginger Purse - Sweet potato & ginger pastry filled with corn, soy beans, shiitake mushrooms, carrot and pickled radish

Tofu Taro Balls

Spinach Rice Paper Rolls - my least favourite because I don't like cooked spinach

Mock Calamari - I was hesitant to try these but they didn't taste fishy and they had a good texture to them

Tofu

Dumplings - my favourite dish, I love the flavour of these

Bbq Mock Pork - I think this was bbq faux pork witha sweetened hoi sin brown sauce, yum!

I think these were tofu skins

Dim Sims

Fried Rice Paper rolls - these were interesting, the outside was crispy, the insides were soft but I didn't like the sauce they came with, it was a bit smoky and sweet

Dessert! Coconut pumpkin balls, tapioca mango pudding, agar purple taro pudding and black stick rice in pandan leaf - I didn't like the purple one, it had a weird texture, but the coconut balls and sticky rice were quite nice

And more coconut pumpkin balls but these were also coated in sesame seeds and fried - these were good

All of this was enough for 6-7 people and we each paid about $13, such a great meal for a very low price! I can't wait to have yum cha again!

We then went next door to Vegan's Choice, a vegan grocery store. They sell cakes, ice cream, lots of frozen meals from Green Gourmet, mock meats, vegan cheeses, as well as burgers by Greenfields and a range of vegan products.

I got a scoop of coconut ice cream because it's one of my favourite flavours but they had a whole range includinng unusual flavours like green tea and black sesame.

And we spotted a cute cat, hanging out in the store :)

I also bought some frozen dumplings and a bar of Plamil's new chocolate with mint white chocolate chips, it's VERY minty!

Babycakes success!

Look at these lil guys! They are sweet 'n' delicious and incredibly easy to make! I made the Strawberry Shortcakes from the Babycakes cookbook on Thursday and was super happy when they turned out so well.

They are one of the spelt recipes in the book and they also use evaporated cane juice rather than agave. The dough came together really well in the Kitchenaid, it was really easy to knead out and wasn't sticky.

Once they were done I cut them open, spread on some of the sugar free icing and added some sliced strawberries. Yum-oh! Seriously, they are sweet and creamy and remind me of scones with jam and cream. So if you have this book, make these now! :)

And while I'm here I'll share a lunch with you that I had last weekend. We went for lunch with our parents at a great restaurant at the Spit, Shores. We've been going there since we were younger but they will be closing in a month so we took this chance to go one last time. It was also the first time I've been since going vegan, but we know the chef and he prepared a really lovely meal for me.

I had a salad for an entree, it was made up of mixed greens, red endive, cucumber, sun dried tomatoes and avocado, now that's a salad!

My main was a very colourful vegetable stack. It started with a base of potato and was topped with broccolini, bok choy, red capsicum, mushrooms and crispy shredded carrot. The sauce that came with it was also delicious.

I also went to dinner that night for a friend's 26th. He chose Rider, a new mexican above the Hopetoun Hotel in Surry Hills and he let me know they are flexible regarding their menu. I looked them up and was very excited to see that they even have "Vegan or gluten-intolerant? All diets catered for" on their menu, win! I emailed them just to be sure and they said most of the menu can be done for vegans and gluten free as well.

I didn't bother uploading the photos I took as the lighting was terrible, they were either dark or fluorestant with the flash, so just imagine yellow and blue corn chips with salsa and guacamole to start as well as baby corn cobs. Then while everyone had quesadillas, I got my own plate with a yummy burrito filled with rice n beans. Then everyone else got tacos and I again got my own plate with two soft tacos filled with roasted capsicum. The taocs were a little flavourless but the burrito and corn cob were yum-oh. Everyone finished with churros so I ate the fresh strawberries, dusted with cinnamon sugar, that were on the churros plate ;)

I would definitely eat there again and I really appreciate the fact that they cater to vegans willingly and that they used the word vegan on their menu!

Rider
416 Bourke St
Surry Hills NSW

Babycakes and a Care Package

I'm at home sick with a sore head thanks to my sinuses, I've been taking garlic, horseradish and vitamin C tablets, eating green veggies and drinking tea that I made by grating fresh ginger and lemon zest into hot water. Hopefully this doesn't last much longer but I thought I'd take the time to blog while I sit on the couch with both cats on my lap :)

A few months ago I pre-ordered a copy of Babycakes, the new cookbook from the bakery of the same name, based in New York. It arrived last week and I was so very, very excited to get my paws on it.

It's a gorgeous hardcover book with lots of colour photos. There's a long introduction about how the bakery came about and the different ingredients used in the recipes.

The book is titled Babycakes - Vegan, Gluten-Free and (mostly) Sugar-Free recipes but not all of the recipes are gluten free, quite a few of them use spelt flour which isn't gluten free and some of the gluten free ones use Bob's Red Mill All Purpose Gluten Free mix, which is not available here but can be ordered online.

Despite that I decided to try the vanilla cupcakes first. The base of these is besan (chickpea/garbanzo) flour as well as rice flour, arrowroot and in total the cupcakes use 3.5 cups of flour for 24 regular cupcakes. The recipe also uses about half a jar of coconut oil and half a bottle of agave as the sweetener plus xanthum gum as a binder. The mix was very fluffy and I ended up making 12 regular cupcakes and 24 mini cupcakes with mix leftover.

I followed the recipe exactly and baked them for the required time. They develop a crust on them and inside they were quite dense and they smelt a bit beany. They were definitely edible but I don't think I would have given them to people to eat. Chris tried them later on and wasn't impressed but the cats liked them, I let them share a mini one.

I made the icing later that day, I added most of the ingredients to the food processor and then added the coconut oil and lemon juice but after blending for a while I could see the ingredients weren't coming together, instead it looked a bit like liquidy cottage cheese. I put the icing in the frige to chill anyway but a few hours later it was still lumpy. We had a bright idea to stick the mix into a saucepan and after heating the mix liquified and I then put it back in the fridge. The morning after it was a thick, airy spread and I was able to top a cupcake or two with it.

I wondered if the icing would liquify at room temperature so I left a cupcake out all day but the icing stayed on, which is great. The icing itself is sweet, almost buttery and is quite nice and I love that it's sugar free. My only issue is that the recipes uses soy milk and soy milk powder but the book does mention that they can be replaced with rice milk and rice milk powder. As far as I know there is now rice milk powder avail. in Australia so I will be ordering some from the USA so I can make these soy free as well.

I am going to try the vanilla cupcakes again another day but for now I will try a few of the other recipes as I have heard of good results with the choc chip cookies and the brownie bites. Chris wants me to make the strawberry shortcake (one of the spelt recipes) so I bought some spelt and will make those when I feel better.

And in more awesome news, my March PPK Care Package arrived yest'day! My partner, jcd, lives in Canada and I got some awesome treats, all gluten free too! I got gluten free pasta in cute shapes, sweet chilli rice crisps (yum!), Swedish berries (delicious raspberry jelly lollies), a jar of No Nuts Peabutter, some red quinoa, vitamin powder, a cinnamon roll Larabar, fruit strips and chews, a block of chocolate, a reusable shopping bag, a recipe for cheezy pasta and the Teany book! Such a great assortment of goods :)



As well as reciving my package I also got my copy of the Swell Vegan zine, woo! There are some very tasty looking recipes in this cute lil book and I look forward to trying them all.

And now I'm going to continue watching Scrubs and drinking ginger lemon tea :)

Vote to Ban Jumps Racing, NOW

Jumps Racing, held in Victoria, has been in the media for a while now. There have been many horses die, 3 just this week and so it has been suspended with a decision to be made next week. Two newspapers in Victoria are running online polls, please go and vote YES to banning Jumps Racing:

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25442562-661,00.html

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2009/05/07/1241289288759.html

People involved in Jumps Racing are speaking out about how much they care for their horses but one trainer went so far as to say he will shoot his 6 horses and present their heads to the Racing Minister if Jumps Racing is banned. That's not classified as caring, it's crual and he shouldn't be allowed near animals, ever again.

Rachel and Pip have both blogged about this as well. Send the links to your family and friends and ask them to send the letter as well.

Please send this letter to the Racing Minister and the Manager of Jumps Racing VIC and let them know the suspension is a good start but that they need to ban Jumps Racing, NOW.