crack the plates

Happy February! Do you love or loathe v-day? I’m pretty indifferent about the sentiment – I shower my Nate with affection year ’round, not just on the 14th – but I adore all the treats. One helpful thing about having been vegan for years is that I’ve been able to try a wide variety… and sporting a sweet tooth that just won’t quit, I have plenty in the off-season, too. Whether you’re buying for your vegan sweetie or just want to give cruelty-free this year, here are my tried-and-true picks for 2012:

Lagusta’s Luscious

Lagusta’s Luscious chocolates are heartbreakingly delicious and painstakingly made by hand with truly artisanal ingredients. Founded in 2003 by a passionate vegan chef, Lagusta’s Luscious artisanal chocolates combine a deep commitment to social justice, environmentalism and animal rights with the love of bold flavor of a true foodie and the obsessive commitment to artisan techniques of a chocolatier. We work closely with small farmers and producers in our beloved town of New Paltz, New York and across the country to source everything from our Maui vanilla beans (from a tiny two-acre vanilla farm) to the candy-striped beets grown by Farmer Jessica less than a mile away. From our 100% fair trade and organic chocolate to our 100% post-consumer recycled paper boxes and packing materials, we are a completely vegan business committed to sustainability without sacrifice. (from the website)

Now, from me: Lagusta is my hero. I fell in love with her tellin’-it-as-it-is style at her personal blog - found while searching for a vegan’s account of Alinea dining – and I stayed for the food. If you’ve hung around Crack the Plates for a while you know she inspired my own meal delivery, after running a successful one in New York for nine years. Now she devotes herself to the chocolate shop full-time. I don’t know how she manages it, but everything she does is perfect. Perfect. That said, her truffle flavors tend to be a bit more mature than you might be used to - beet-coriander, anyone? Sea salt seaweed shiitake? The best place to buy for the sophisticated eaters in your life, she’s also got plenty of the less-adventurous, including peppermint patties, peanut butter cups, and a pomegranate and lemon gift box. You simply can’t go wrong.

For valentine’s, she’s gifted the world with “a six-inch two-piece heart box made entirely of delicious edible semisweet chocolate is filled with nine artisanal treats, then carefully sealed with chocolate ‘glue,’ wrapped in a compostable vegetable cellulose bag and tied with a gorgeous red ribbon made from compostable vegetable fiber. Each heart is filled with two Cashew Rosewater Cream “Love” Hearts, two White Chocolate Strawberry Hearts, one Large Stone ground Cinnamon Solid Heart with cardinals with hand-painted red wings (painted with beet-derived tinted cocoa butter), one Intense Anatomical Heart with black salt, cacao nibs, coffee beans, and dried cherries, one Butterscotch Caramel wrapped in red damask paper, and Two tiny Blue Birds of Happiness—solid 60% chocolate hand-painted with blue and green wings.” $35. (Link)

Desiderio Chocolates

I was introduced to Vanessa Dione’s creations via head Vegansaur Laura’s late-2011 freak-out over Gourmellows. Gourmellows are half-marshmallow, half-truffle, all deliciousness, as Dione puts it. I totally agree, but I fell in love with the Nougatissimo. Her Gourmellows are a treat anyone could love, but the crunchy, fresh, abundant almonds, pistachios and hazelnuts bound in not-too-sweet-or-sticky vegan nougat (with the option of chocolate-covered) reduced me to a puddle. (Note to all my friends: giving me choco Nougatissimo earns you a permanent +1000. :-)) The caramels (Caramella) are also scrumptious. I recommend the vegan sampler so you can try everything and decide for yourself! At $7.50, it’s a steal! (etsy shop; her website: vegan line and inspiration.)

Sjaak’s Organic Chocolates

Based in Petaluma, California, Sjaak’s mission is to create the highest quality gourmet organic chocolates possible while simultaneously supporting a positive work environment, fair trade practices and encouraging sustainable agriculture through the use of organic, non-GMO ingredients. It is also the goal of Sjaak’s Organic Chocolates to build a socially responsible, profitable business that can be carried on for generations to come. (from the website). I’ve been happily eating Sjaak’s for years. Omnivores and dairy fiends who’ve been blessed with sampler boxes have loved every bite. Some of your v-day options include: organic raspberry bites, vegan “milk” chocolate nuts & chews valentine’s box, a giant tub – about 110 pieces – of solid fair-trade chocolate hearts, limited edition hearts of cherry box, individual hearts of cherry, nuts & chews in a limited edition handmade box, limited edition Birdie box, and the dark chocolate lavender truffles in a beautiful box. My favorites are the organic fair-trade European assortment ($9.95 for 9 pieces) and the English Toffee ($9.95/bag).

Note: If items are sold out on Sjaak’s website, look for them at Cosmo’s Vegan Shoppe, Food Fight! or another online vegan store.

What I Got for Myself: Spencer’s Market Be My Vegan Valentine Deal

I’ll be doing an entire post on my favorite Spencer’s Market soon, but the quick version is that it’s a private vegan weekly deals site offering limited quantities of small-batch vegan products at up to 70% off. Signing up is a breeze: Do so here. They just ask for your name and e-mail address and only e-mail you when new deals are out (once a week). Alas, the Vegan Valentine deal sold-out fast – but you can still get Obsessive Confection Disorder’s treats here. OR you can pick up the current Spencer’s deal – Green Tara Spirulina treats – and tell your healthy sweetie you want them around for a long, long time.

Sweet and Sara Vegan Marshmallows

Sweet and Sara vegan marshmallows are delicious! They’ve got all the gentle yielding puffy meltable sweetness of a “regular” marshmallow without all the total abhorrent yuckiness of gelatin. Despite their being made “from real strawberries”, the strawberry marshies are, in my experience, very delicately sweet and not very berry – they actually remind me more of pink cotton candy in the best possible way! This year they’re offering a beautiful chocolate-dipped strawberry marshmallow heart at $3.50 per piece.

Thoughtful Valentine Treats for a Crowd: Equal Exchange Kits

For office, classroom, and beyond, the “My Fair Valentine” kit from Equal Exchange chocolates is the perfect way to share v-day treats with a lot of friends. For $9.99 you get a kit of 24 mini chocolates and 24 cards with cute illustrations and fair-trade information. Spread awareness and love at the same time for a totally reasonable price. I’m kind of a loner these days, but if I worked in an office/was still a student, I’d definitely be snatching up several of these kits. It can be hard to just start talking to someone about the importance of fair-trade – especially if you don’t know them very well – but these precious kits make breaking the ice a breeze.

Unsweetened options

I’ve been drinking the “chocolate-covered strawberry” Valentines Tea from Adagio Teas since college. For Valentine’s this year they’re offering the Love Petals teas. Noting that they contain cream and chocolate flavors, I e-mailed the company to find out if they’re vegan. Fifteen minutes later I received a reply: ”None of our flavors contain dairy, and the chocolate chip pieces in our flavored teas are vegan as well.” Hooray!

Ways to give and give!

My dear best pal Jenny runs a small vegan baking and savory food business in Chicago called The Mixing Bowl Bakery. This Valentine’s day she’s offering cupcakes, chocolate-covered strawberries, frosted cookies, and oreo truffles at ridiculously low prices. (Think a dozen cookies for $14 and four giant chocolate-dipped strawberries for $5. Yeah.) The first two are local only (delivery and pick-up) and the last two are shippable. Ten percent of the proceeds from her valentine’s sales will go to Chicago-based Mercy for Animals.

I’ve noticed that lots of no-kill shelters and animal advocacy groups do special Valentine’s events, either by reducing the cost of adoption or simply highlighting potential future friends. Even if they don’t advertise anything, if you’re ready to adopt a friend, ASK! And if your house is full-up, it is always a good idea to donate to an animal advocacy group like Mercy for Animals (not PETA!) or a no-kill shelter. I am proudly 100% against buying animals while homeless pets are left to suffer and die. (Even if you have an allergy or feel you need to get a “special breed” there are plenty of single-breed rescues if you’re willing to do a little bit of work.) Further, non-profits like MFA and your local shelters rely almost entirely on donations for their operating costs. Every little bit counts! If you’re in Atlanta, I recommend PAWS no-kill shelter or my friend Elizabeth, who runs the wildlife rehabilitation center (specializing in raccoons) Tails from the Hart (current buddies-in-residence featured above).

for do-it-yourself folks!

I recommend the following cookbooks for making treats for your sweet: Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar, Vegan Pie in the Sky; Vegan With a Vengeance (Nate requests the chocolate raspberry thumbprint as his vegan v-day gift); Vegan Brunch – the best way to start the day; More Great-Good Dairy Free Desserts by Fran Costigan; Ani Phyo’s Ani’s Raw Food Desserts (the chocolate fudge cake pictured here will blow your mind); Sinfully Vegan by Lois Dieterly.

After a lovely dinner of barbequed oven-baked tofu, Nate I are settling in to watch Disney’s Alice in Wonderland in protest of the Burton abomination presently sweeping the nation. (Has anyone I know actually seen it yet? What did you think? Or, if not, why are you avoiding?)

One of my favorite scenes.

These days I drink only a handful of times a year; tonight I’m enjoying a lovely beer called Éphémère by Unibroue, a Canadian brewing company. According to their website, it “possesses a fresh apple aroma with reminiscent notes of ‘Granny Smith’ and ‘McIntosh’ a subtle flavour of green apple is complemented by delicate notes of fruit and spice topped by a rich white head.” I first tried it in October at Chicago’s vegan bike-themed restaurant, Handlebar; Nate picked up a couple more bottles at the famous Half Time party shop in Poughkeepsie, New York, over Christmas. It’s best served in a champagne flute.

If you’re a vegan who enjoys spirits, you’ll do well to check out Barnivore: your vegan beer & wine guide. It proved an invaluable resource last fall as I bought for Nate’s Hobbit-themed birthday bash. I was surprised that every specialty beer I looked up was accounted for: Gulden Draak (more at Beer Advocate), Weyerbacher (Merry Monks; Quad), Hitachino Nest Ginger Brew by Kiuchi, Trappistes Rochefort (#10, bebe), Lagunitas (Censored & IPA), Unibroue (La Fin Du Monde & Trois Pistoles), and Rogue (Rogue’s Hazelnut Brown Nectar makes me melt!). They’re not all available in Indiana; I had to pick up the Lagunitas in Michigan while visiting Jina beena.

Speaking of, check all this gorgeous bottle opener she brought back from Greece in 2007:

Thanks, Jiji. You are one classy lady.

For our sumptuous tofu dinner I used Isa’s “BBQ Pomegranate Tofu” recipe as a guide. Have you been eyeing that one in Vegan with a Vengeance but haven’t yet tried it because it calls for crazy ingredients? Well, don’t be bullied by the inclusion of pomegranate molasses–I’ve been using plain ol blackstrap & the dish always turns out fine. I also subbed a finely-chopped onion for the shallots tonight & used crunchy peanut butter instead of plain.

Don’t have Vegan with a Vengeance? Buy a copy! It’s one of the best vegan cookbooks out there for new & seasoned vegs alike. You won’t be disappointed. (And, of course, if you’re in the Richmond area you’re welcome to use my food-spattered copy.)

(PS: I typed this entire post tipsy. How obvious?)

My dear friend Jacquie over at Constant Conversion has been doing Photo Friday posts recently. This week she channels Cookie (“‘C’ is for..”) & the rest of the Sesame Street gang with a focus on the letter T & what it stands for in her life right now: tea, teamwork, & treasures. And what a treasure of a post it was! Best of all, she inspired me to start my own “Photo Friday” series: food pics Friday is here!

These pictures were taken when Nate & I visited our friend Catherine (and, to a lesser extent, the Interfaith Youth Core Annual Conference) in Chicago last October. Let me tell you about Arya Bhavan! Just a short bus ride from C’s place in the historically German Lincoln Square Neighborhood (where a piece of the Berlin Wall resides in a bus station), Arya Bhavan is located on Devon Avenue in “the heart of India town in Chicago”. A night view from the other side of the street:

The food was delicious, the setting serene:

You might not expect to have too much contact with wait staff at a buffet restaurant, but Arya Bhavan is different. We were immediately greeted by a polite, kind young host who led us to a table, provided drinks, & invited us to the buffet. I have no idea how he guessed, but it’s a testament to his extraordinary hospitality skills that he immediately confirmed our veganism–and then thoughtfully took us through the the large buffet, pointing out what was “suitable”. (Happily, over 80% of the offerings were vegan!)

I was over the moon for his hospitality at this point–but then he secretly notified the kitchen of our presence & asked the cooks to prepare a special vegan garlic & onion naan! We felt like royalty when our special surprise arrived:

Make no mistake–I later lavished praise upon him in front of the management.

The meal itself was divine, though we both needed Tums later. (Spicy!) Here’s a shot of Nate’s plate:

I highly recommend Arya Bhavan for all of the reasons described (pictured!) above–and particularly for the price. The dinner buffet was $11/person not including drinks (but we just got water). Next time I’m in Chicago you bet I’m showing up with an empty stomach, a handful of antacids, & a few hours to spare.

As a bonus, here are a couple of embarrasing shots of Nate & me enjoying vegan avocado bubble tea in Chinatown:

greasy hair, gigantic grin, tapioca tooth.

After that last intense (for a food blog) post, I feel the urge to post some pictures of tonight’s dinner:

Doubled recipe of the Asparagus and sun-dried tomato “Frittata” from Vegan With a Vengeance, made with tofu, nutritional yeast, mustard, and many other disparate ingredients that don’t sound like they’ll taste all that good together but actually makes one swoon. One of the best recipes in the book.

Looking to do something with the Dandies Candies marshmallows I brought back from Chicago (aside from gobble them straight from the bag), I googled and discovered a recipe from a fellow VeganMoFoer p.h.d.elicious called Chocolate Confetti. Simple concept: chocolate + peanut butter + fat (eBal!) + vegan marshmallows makes a veg very, very happy. :-) I threw in peanuts and added a little salt.

Befitting an anniversary, I scooped out half a container of Turtle Mountain’s Purely Decadent Cookie Dough soy ice cream, drove a sharp piece of bark into it and covered it with organic chocolate sauce and peanuts. Yowzah. (To my credit, I didn’t eat it.)

And for those who care, a picture of our darling Ra-Ra type Unix, a veteran open-source user. Yay Ubuntu 9.10! Hoorah Karmic Koala!

Hello friends! Sorry I’ve been MIA for the last several days. Turns out, wedding our haste to flee to Chicago with a pragmatic zeal for unplugging appliances meant we accidentally unplugged our router–oops!I had hoped to blog my food adventures from the windy city, but that inability means I’m just gonna have to catch up now, from Richmond. Le sigh.

Relatedly, tonight marked a glum return to cooking for myself. After spoiling ourselves with Chicago Diner, vegan marshmallows, an Indian buffet, plenty of stuff from the vegan+macrobiotic bar at Whole Foods, and not to mention the fact of other people cooking, serving, and cleaning up, I sought the most fuss-free dinner imaginable. To be completely honest, this was only after resisting cooking anything for about 2 hours. Yeah, I whined.

But it is wonderful to be able to eat, to have full pantries from which to cook, to own all the tools necessary for the job, and to have the energy and ability to make something tasty. Noting these blessings (albeit a bit grudgingly), I settled on tacos. They may be embarrassingly easy to make (see below), but they’re special in their own way: tacos are one of the first main courses I learned to make vegan.

The year was 2002 and I sought something to serve to my then-major-meat-eating BF. Using the Boca crumbles, a dash of spice, and the ability to lie well, I totally passed em off on him. Not only that, but I taught my best friend (a very lovely, very Southern lady called Jessica) how to play the same trick on her flesh-loving country husband. Veg evangelism, I tell ya what.

For those who are interested in spreading the good news: Reconstitute some veggie beef crumbles (these days I use the dry stuff from Dixie Diner) in boiling water with vegan bouillon.  Saute an onion in oil with garlic and whatever seasonings one prefers. Add the veg*meat and cook. Add more seasonings. Stuff taco shells, bake at 350-400 for a few minutes, serve.

They’re not fancy, complex, or even all that attractive, but tacos get the job done.

Tonight I would like to share with you the miracle that is Chicago Diner food. The Chicago Diner is a veritable (almost-)vegan institution: it came into existence the year before I was born (1983) and serves some of the best food I’ve ever eaten, period. (Marvellously, this figure *includes* the food I cook for myself.) No joke, folks–it’s just that good.

Proof? Allow me to take you on a little foodie photo-journey.

Because buffalo wings are one of Nate’s most-missed foods, we began with that appetizer: 5-6 hearty strips of beefy seitan thoroughly soaked in a spicy, vinegary Buffalo sauce with the cooling mock-Bleu dip. As fun as dipping can be, I advise cutting the strips with your fork and knife and drenching a piece in the dip.

My app of choice was the potstickers–I can’t resist em. These were filled with fairly-typical fare: shredded cabbage, tofu, carrots, etc, and was served with an oustanding dipping sauce.

Choosing an entree was difficult. I really wanted the country fried “steak”, but something urged me towards the mushroom ravioli. (Described on the menu: Porcini & button mushroom filled pasta, over baby greens, with herbed almond alfredo sauce.) It was tasty but I’m very glad Nate chose the country fried steak because we ended up swapping entrees–we each liked the other’s better!

The gloriously crispy, gravy-covered County fried “steak”: Breaded seitan filet topped with country gravy and served with rustic mashed potatoes and sauteed vegetables. It was so tasty, so greasy, and so authentic that it would fool my Grandpa.

Seeing as how cheesecake is one of Nate’s other most favorite non-vegan things and we were in the business of fulfilling our cruelty-free foodie dreams tonight, we had to end the meal with some of the famous Chicago Diner cheesecake. It was everything a pecan cheesecake could hope to be. Nevertheless, I’m glad that it wasn’t too different from one that my vegan ex Brian once made, as it demonstrates that even we mere mortals can do vegan cheesecake well. (The key, it seems, is a willingness to spend the cash on the Tofutti, or else make your own vegan creme cheeze a la Bryanna Clark Grogan.)

The vegan peanut butter chocolate chip cookie milkshake: honestly? There are no words to describe it. Only this command: GET THEE TO THE CHICAGO DINER POST HASTE. I am not kidding. Iffest thou findest thyself in the Chicagolandarea and thou obstainest from such as this, thou art…effing missing out, you hear? And unless you’re allergic to peanuts, don’t even consider the other shake flavors–this one’s where it’s at (even the servers say so, a little adorably conspiratorially).

Caveat: it was expensive. As this was our first vacation together in almost a year of dating, Nate & I were willing to splurge. So please note that unless you make bundles of money, the full-on Chicago Diner experience described above is best left for a special occasion: our meal + a generous tip for our amazing server ran right around $75 (for a couple that usually hems and haws over sharing a $5 burrito, this is the furthest thing from pocket-change.)

So go, go, go to the Chicago Diner. Whatever you do, don’t believe the disaffected hipster on your friend’s couch who claims it’s overrated: go see, taste, enjoy for yourself.