I love sugar

UK ice cream shop going vegan!

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Amazing news!

An ice cream and dessert parlour in Withington, Manchester is turning into a 100% vegan establishment from April 4, 2017.

Ice Shack is set to impress as they bring 22 vegan ice creams (a mixture of sorbets and ice creams) into the parlour, as well as a counter featuring approximately 10 cakes!

All dairy ice cream flavours are being fazed out and removed as I type, in preparation for the huge new direction next week.

In addition, Ice Shack will feature a chocolate counter hosting more than 20 vegan dark, milk and white chocolate truffles, a raw chocolate bar range featuring five flavours, chocolate shortbreads and a vegan dog biscuit range with peanut butter and carrot treats.

Want a milkshake? You can choose between soy, almond or oat milk at Ice Shack.

In even more amazing news (well, for me anyway), the owners of the ice cream parlour have named a brand new flavour after me. Yes, me!

You will be able to get your fill of Fat Gay Vegan Mojito. I’m so excited to have a flavour named after me and super proud to be a tiny, tiny part of this incredible vegan business transformation.

If you live in Manchester, make it a priority to get along after April 4, 2017 and support this independent business. Ice Shack is basing everything on our community getting behind them so make plans and buy a lot and buy often.

Follow Ice Shack on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. Show them all the love and thank them for everything they are doing to help reduce harm to cows. Amazing. I’m in awe.

TV show featuring vegan bakers

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Do you love cake?

There is a TV show featuring Paul Hollywood (Great British Bake Off host) called City Bakes. Aired on Food Network UK, the show follows Hollywood around the planet in search of baked delights.

The Food Network synopsis of the show reads:

Paul Hollywood rekindles his baking roots as he travels the globe in search of the family bakeries, corner delis and luxury hotels which have created the baking heritage of entire cities. During these city breaks, Paul is inspired once again to produce delicious recipes in the very place they originated as he goes “back to the floor” in hotel kitchens, rediscovers family recipes and meets new baking heroes from around the world.

A new episode of the show airing on Monday March 27, 2017 at 9pm in the UK features the host travelling to LA to check out local bakeries.

Word has it the episode features some vegan baking.

How do I know this?

The lovely Ben of Ms. Cupcake vegan bakery in Brixton alerted me to a special ‘live on the Internet’ session featuring Ms. Cupcake herself, Mellissa Morgan, taking place on Monday as a show tie-in.

To help promote the Paul Hollywood LA episode airing on Monday, Mellissa Morgan will be featured in an exclusive Facebook livestream at 11am in which she will talk through creating the perfect vegan cake. From learning about egg, dairy and animal product replacements to secret baking techniques, this twenty minute demo will inspire you to bake decadent vegan cakes.

Mellissa Morgan is the undisputed UK queen of indulgent vegan baking, so take this opportunity to ask questions through the Facebook live event hosted on the Food Network UK Facebook Page before checking out City Bakes in the evening this Monday (March 27, 2017).

Win vegan Easter Eggs

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You all love a competition, right?

My friends at Moo Free Chocolates have given me three of their delicious vegan Easters Eggs to give to one of my Twitter followers.

Moo Free make some of my favourite chocolate on the planet, including the bar with caramelised hazelnut fragments. And the one with the vegan honeycomb. And the one with cranberries. And the one…. well, you get the idea. I adore all of their stuff.

So, what do you get if you win this competition?

There is the Original with buttons, the Bunnycomb with buttons, and the Orange with buttons.

You can find these eggs in supermarkets, health food stores and Holland & Barrett outlets around the UK.

Now for the competition.

  1. Draw a celebrity in Easter Egg form (yes, really!). Pick your favourite celebrity and draw a picture of what they would look like as an Easter Egg
  2. Tag @fatgayvegan and @moofreechoccies (and your chosen celebrity if you wish)
  3. Use #WinWithFGV in your tweet
  4. Make sure you attach your picture to your tweet!
  5. Enter as many different drawings/illustrations as you want

One winner will be picked by me following the competition closing at midnight Friday March 24, 2017 GMT. I will be in touch with the winner to grab their postal address, which I will pass onto the company as they will be sending your prize of three eggs. The prize can only be mailed within the UK. If you are outside the UK, please feel free to join in the fun. We could always mail the prize to your friend in the UK.

Follow Moo Free on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. This is not a requirement of the competition, it just would be a nice thing to do!

Get going and be creative. Be eggcellent. Be Moo Free.

Don’t already follow me on Twitter? Get busy!

Tegan the Vegan London

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Being half a world away in Mexico City for half of every year means I miss out on a lot of incredible vegan food developments in London.

Of course I’m reporting as much as I possibly can, but I can’t physically get my greedy hands on a lot of the new and interesting stuff. If I’m completely honest, it does lead to a slight case of FOMO.

Take Tegan the Vegan for instance.

Tegan has been burning up the east London vegan scene for a little while now, but I’m yet to taste any of her amazing-looking food due to my globetrotting ways.

You can find Tegan the Vegan getting involved in all manner of events around the UK capital (and sometimes slightly further afield) and everyone I know who has tried her treats can’t stop raving about her skills. Tegan seems to have something very special going on.

There is often a weekly cake and vegan cheese menu posted via the Tegan the Vegan Facebook page and if you live in her catchment area, you can place an order for home delivery.

Check out this sample menu below.

OK. Before I make myself completely starving and jealous, let me give you a few links so you can get involved with this vegan food business on the rise. Get in on the ground floor before Tegan is recognised as London’s next vegan superstar!

Like Tegan the Vegan on Facebook. Follow Tegan the Vegan on Twitter and Instagram.

Now I’m going to spoil you with one of my favourite photos from Tegan’s Facebook page. Enjoy.

Extra note: Tegan’s incredible logo was created by Alex Bertram-Powell. See his art here.

All photos and images are property of Tegan the Vegan and reproduced here for publicity purposes.

New vegan ice cream

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Fry’s Family Foods have been at the forefront of vegan chilled and frozen grocery items in the UK for years.

The brand has a loyal following of consumers (me included) who adore their meat alternatives.

Those fans have suddenly got a whole lot more to celebrate as Fry’s Family Foods have now released their very own vegan ice cream range into the UK.

Yep. Another vegan ice cream brand!

As you can see, there are five flavours to get involved with and they are all currently exclusively available via Ocado. I’ve been assured that it won’t be long until they are also stocked by Holland & Barrett.

The coconut based ice creams are available in Salted Caramel, Vanilla Bean Espresso, Madagascan Vanilla Bean, Toasted Coconut and Tons of Cookies varieties.

How excited are you to have another vegan ice cream option in the UK? Have you tried these tubs by Fry’s? How were they?

You can visit Fry’s online on Facebook.

Vegan eggs

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Here is the shortest blog post I have ever done.

Vegan Easter eggs. Flavours? Orange, original and bunnycomb. Chocolate buttons included.

In a lot of UK stores and supermarkets from now.

Visit Moo Free Chocolate online.

Best vegan donuts in London

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London. You are onto a good wicket.

(Does ‘good wicket’ actually mean anything? Am I using that term correctly?)

After a short time away from the action, the glorious Peanut Butter Bakery is BACK to its usual weekend haunt at The Boiler House market on Brick Lane (see location on Google Maps).

Peanut Butter Bakery caused an absolute sensation at my vegan Christmas market, with people lining up for an extremely long time to get hands and lips on their sensational donuts.

If you think you would enjoy eating the best vegan donuts in the UK, get along to The Boiler House on Saturday 4 and Sunday 5 February, 2017. You will be unbelievably happy if you make the effort to get along.

To inspire you, here is a photo just posted by Peanut Butter Bakery detailing some of the things you should be excited about this weekend.


You need to follow Peanut Butter Bakery on Instagram.

Big vegan dessert pots

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You all know about Pudology so I’m not even going to waste my time reminding you of the decadent, creamy dessert pots this company makes.

They are one of the finest plant-based food lines in the entire UK.

Well, get ready to tweet this news to your nearest and dearest because Pudology are launching BIG tubs in Ocado.

As you can see above, the larger tubs are available in the Deeply Decadent Chocolate and the Smooth Chocolate Orange varieties.

But how much bigger are they?

You will be used to the original tubs coming as 85g twin packs, but these new tubs are a jumbo-sized 350g!

If you hurry, Ocado have these new larger tubs on special deal for £1 off.

Enjoy and follow Pudology on Instagram.

Vegan cakes at London markets

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I just got the best kind of email you can hope to receive. It was all about vegan cake.

There is a gorgeous vegan baking business in London called Vegan Delice and what they are putting out into the world deserves to be celebrated.

Check out some of these treats.

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I’m not sure about you, but there isn’t anything pictured above of which I wouldn’t eat at least two.

It’s all so dreamy.

I asked Chantal at Vegan Delice what goes on over at her baking headquarters and she said:

Passionate about the pleasure that my customers will feel when they are tasting my bakes, I ensure that the most important ingredient, ‘LOVE’ is always my present.

I take the time to make a lot of ingredients from scratch, such as my vanilla paste as its genuinely important to me that the products are 100% vegan, I also make my own raw chocolate that tastes similar to OMBAR (my inspiration) and I use this in a lot of my bakes to add a luxurious flavour.

I specialise in vegan cupcakes, doughnuts, cookies, as well as Cypriot style baked goods too. They are made from organic and locally sourced produce were available. I also include a sugar free, gluten free, and soy free range.

Do you like what you see and hear?

Vegan Delice will be trading at the Tottenham Green Market on December 3, 11 and 18, 2016 and at the Myddleton Road Festival on December 4, 2016.

Keep track of Vegan Delice via Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

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Vegan fudge alert

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Here is the news that every sweet-obsessed vegan has been waiting to read.

Fudge superstars Scoff are returning to the world for a limited Christmas run and you can get involved by ordering your very own supply.

If you don’t remember Scoff, the independent food company was loved for their delicious and truly mouthwatering fudge sold mainly via a stall in Brixton. Every single piece of sugary delight was flawless.

Owner and fudge creator Jane scaled back the business due to demands of having to move house and care for twin babies (I’m certain the babies are the hard part!), but she is now ready to dive back into fudge production with a limited festive run available for postal delivery.

I cannot stress enough how amazing this fudge is. You MUST buy some.

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The line up of flavours this festive season includes:

  • Classic vanilla fudge
  • Chocolate fudge
  • Cherry brandy fudge
  • Chocolate orange fudge
  • “Baileys” fudge
  • White chocolate and raspberry fudge

You can buy these flavours in mixed 12 and 24 piece boxes, or if you only fancy certain flavours you can buy individual bags of each.

You need to order online by December 16, 2016 and your fudge delivery will arrive before Christmas.

Enjoy! Follow Scoff on Facebook and Twitter.

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