Vegan banana split

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I know the majority of readers are based in the socially, politically and financially crumbling UK so I thought I would offer you some pure vegan food escapism to brighten up your bleak week.

During my trip to Los Angeles last week, I had the extreme pleasure of visiting a completely vegan soft serve frozen yoghurt store located in Glendale.

Yoga-Urt is a gorgeous experience from top to bottom. Friendly people, delicious yoghurt (old school, isolationist UK spelling!) and a delightful selection of vegan toppings.

Take a look at the stunning banana split below and tell me if you can even handle it!

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Save your devalued Pounds and get to California for some frozen goodness at Yoga-Urt.

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Is Brexit already affecting vegan business?

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This email was sent out to customers of online vegan grocery retailer, Veganstore.co.uk, following the E.U. Referendum results.

I have reproduced it with kind permission.

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Latest news from veganstore.co.uk

Dear Friends,

As a non-political company it was never my intention to enter into any of the debate on the Brexit issue.

Each of us is entitled to our viewpoint. Unfortunately, it looks like the outcome will have an impact on some of our products.

The vote will mean a lot of change as we’ve all seen already in the financial markets.

The exchange rates are some of the lowest that we’ve seen since we started trading 17 years ago.

A lot of your favourite products are manufactured outside the UK. There’s the obvious ones that we import from the US, such as Go Max Bars, Primal Jerky and The Vegg.

The amazing alternatives we get from within the E.U. include Pernigotti Truffles, Soyatoo Whipping Cream, Topas Chorizo, Vivani Chocolate and Vantastic Foods Parmezano.

Even UK companies, such as Goody Good Stuff, Freedom Marshmallows and some of our own brand products are made in the EU, when we can’t get the suppliers here.

So why am I telling you all this ?

Well almost overnight the cost of products has gone up potentially as much as 10% and what that unfortunately means to us all is that prices will also rise.

We are holding our prices for now but they will inevitable increase over the next few weeks.

I wish it could be different but we will keep working to bring you the best vegan products from wherever they are in this world.

Best wishes,

Lisa

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Veggie Pret staying open all summer

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A lot of vegans are happy with the selection of animal-free sandwiches on offer at the Veggie Pret pop up shop in Soho.

News sites have been busy telling the world how well the temporary store front has been doing financially and that the vegan options have been some of the best-selling menu items.

Well, it appears the vegetarian version of Pret a Manger is staying around a little bit longer than originally planned. The company announced today that the Broadwick Street vegetarian shop will be staying open throughout the entire summer.

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If you dig a little further into the Pret website, you will find this page dedicated to the animal welfare policies of the sandwich chain.

Now, my intention isn’t to start a shit storm over this but I find this greenwashing a little tough to swallow. Yes, I believe some people within the company are pushing for better treatment of animals and possibly some of the workers are vegan. But I don’t appreciate a corporation using terms like ‘happy cows, happy milk, moo’ when we all know how milk is produced.

Even if a cow gets to strut about a green field all day, she still needs to be forcibly inseminated to become pregnant on time every time in order to be a lucrative milk producer.

And then there are sections of their website on happy pigs who are deliriously ecstatic before being slaughtered for bacon. Or what about the farm bred fish or line caught tuna? Line caught means being flung onto the deck of a boat and then suffocating.

You can all come at me with ‘we should be grateful for what vegan stuff we get’ and ‘a no meat shop in Soho is incredible’ but I’m from the old-school train of thought that victories are hard won, not handed to us. I’m interested by the shop’s success, but I’m not about to allow the rest of the animal-suffering they engage in go unnoticed.

Pret have made this decision to keep this shop open because vegans are making them money. We get this same ‘know your food’ routine from places like Whole Foods Market and we need to realise that these changes are because campaigners have worked hard for decades, vegans make their consumer voices heard and groups such as The Vegan Society talk non-stop to businesses like Pret. 

Shop with them for their vegan options if you choose, but don’t let greenwashing campaigns like this stop you from asking for more plant-based food and less animal suffering. Say thank you for the vegan stuff if you want but follow it up with a ‘you can do more’.

Use your vegan clout. Pret are obviously taking notice.

Extra note: this is not an attempt to shame people who shop at Pret for their vegan options. I do it sometimes when I am in London. Rather it is a post to acknowledge the latest news regarding the vegetarian pop up while asking people to realise we don’t have to stop saying ‘more vegan’ whenever someone throws a plant-based bone our way.

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Jobs in London

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I truly appreciate the work carried out by Made in Hackney. The food justice charity is all about bringing vegan food knowledge, availability and expertise to people in low income, at risk and hard to reach situations.

If you haven’t heard about the project before, you need to get to their website to read about their outstanding work and book yourself in to one of their cooking classes. The money you pay will help Made in Hackney carry on with their vital support work.

If I have sold you on how fab they are, maybe you would also consider working with the group. There are currently two positions looking to be filled with Made in Hackney.

Here are the brief job descriptions lifted from the website.

1) Project Manager – Programmes

£28,000 pro rota – 28 hours/week (4 days)

This is an exciting role leading the key projects and operations at Made in Hackney. The successful candidate will work directly with two other Project Managers, a Project Coordinator (Public Health) a Finance Manager, a Venue Manager, freelance cookery teachers, apprentices and a large network of volunteers whom deliver Made In Hackney’s varied programme of cookery classes.

The ideal candidate will have experience working in a cross section of the social enterprise, charity and/or public sectors, as well as education and/or community health. They will be an experienced project manager, skilled at multi-tasking and will feel as comfortable presenting to a panel of Public Health professionals as getting stuck in with clearing out the compost bin or solving an IT problem. A detailed understanding of, and passion for the health and environmental issues underpinning Made In Hackney’s food policy (local, seasonal, organic, planet based) and mission is essential. Experience/knowledge of food growing and environmental issues preferred.

The experience of working at Made in Hackney is varied, unique and very rewarding.  There is no ‘typical’ day and we are looking for someone who is flexible to work out of the normal office working hours (for example at weekend market stalls etc.) There is plenty of room for the successful candidate to be creative and bring new ideas for developing existing programmes and activities.

2) Newly created vacancy for a Venue Manager 

£24,000 pro rota – 7 hours/week (1 day)

This is a newly created role responsible for organising the day to day kitchen venue and office space at Made in Hackney in Stoke Newington. The ideal candidate will have experience managing a community venue, project or kitchen, (eg. nursery, restaurant) taking client bookings and working in education and/or community health. They will be experienced project managers, skilled at multi-tasking and will feel as comfortable meeting potential new kitchen hire clients as getting stuck in with clearing out the compost bin or solving an IT problem.

The closing date for applying for these jobs is July 15, 2016. Click here to get more information on applying.

Yay for Made in Hackney!

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Horses are not for Pride

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I feel like everyone should be on the same side when it comes to this, but apparently not.

I attended Mexico City LGBTQ Pride March yesterday and was dismayed to see horses being ridden along the crowded, noisy parade route.

Then today I woke to the following tweet by comrades SuperVegan:


Yep, it seems that horses are not only being used as a pinkwashing marketing tool by a huge corporation, but are also being forced into distressing situations.

Do I need to list all the things wrong with this? OK, here goes:

  • Companies such as Wells Fargo should not be in a Pride parade. It is a fucked appropriation of a social movement crucial to the survival of queer people. It is icky and exploitative.
  • Horses are sensitive animals who can be startled and injured in crowd settings. Traffic, noise, calamity, heat and the general intensity of the streets of NYC is NEVER a good place for a horse.
  • If you want to make an argument for times gone past when horses pulled carts on farms so it is OK for them to pull wagons on city streets, slap yourself with a sloppy piece of tofu. You need to wake up.
  • The Wells Fargo horse pulled carriage attraction is called Stagecoach. This is old school romanticising of frontier life that is not a progressive or inclusive way to market in 2016. It’s some wild west, taming-the-savage-landscape type of bullshit that makes the USA look like a place where white people used to be happy in simpler times. It does. Don’t argue with me on this one.

If you are concerned about horses being used as a corporate marketing tool in LGBTQ parades, tweet Wells Fargo here. This attraction is being rolled out at Pride events all over the place. If your Pride event is on the list, tell organisers it is not acceptable.

Even if you don’t give a shit about queer people but still care about the horses, check out this MASSIVE list of upcoming events and parades across the USA where these horses are being forced to appear. Then tweet Wells Fargo. Then get the fuck off my website.

If all of the compounded reasons I list above have you filled with anger and/or despair, share this blog post and start raising awareness in your area.

Stop appropriation of queer events by big business, stop exploitation of animals and stop the perpetual romanticising of violent colonial history.

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Facebook Live

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Have you seen the new Internet broadcast tool called Facebook Live?

This nifty way of publishing on the social network allows people to interact in real time, with the page author video streaming while readers comment below.

I have done two of these Facebook Live streams on my page now and I’m getting a lot of enjoyment from them. Actually, I’m hooked!

You can watch two of my Facebook Live streams here and here. Yep, once each live stream has ended Facebook instantly saves the video meaning people can watch it back anytime.

If you don’t already like my Facebook page, do it now!

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New vegan donut café

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Post by:

joe panel

Just when you thought that Berlin just couldn’t get any better for vegan food, along comes another place to make you drool. And this one is a corker!

Brammibal’s have been selling incredible vegan doughnuts at fairs and through other vegan cafés for about a year now, but finally they’ve achieved their goal of opening a café all of their own. And I’m pleased to say it’s excellent. The café is spacious and relaxing, a great place to spend an hour or so. It feels like it’s a piece of New York City transported across the Atlantic, I’m not quite sure why but that’s the feeling I get (in a good way!).

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The headline product is the doughnuts, of course. A wide range of sticky, sweet confections which are well worth travelling for. But it’s not all about the sugar – even though it’s not promoted much, they also have excellent coffee and sandwiches. We had one with grilled BBQ tempeh and portobello mushroom, and another with cashew cheese and smoked “lox”, made from thinly-sliced carrot. (Lox isn’t a word I’d ever heard in Britain, but I recently learned that it’s used in North America to describe smoked salmon. And it surely comes from the German word “lachs”.) They were both magnificent.

You can find out more about Brammibal’s online.

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Follow Your Heart products headed for UK

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During my recent trip to California, I had the immense pleasure of being invited to the Follow Your Heart headquarters north of Los Angeles.

I saw a lot of amazing things but the biggest news for UK readers is this batch of products headed to stores this July. Yes, in a matter of weeks!

Check them out:

new UK products

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Which of these glorious products are you most looking forward to getting your hands on?

I can vouch for both the shredded and grated Parmesans. I’ve tried these in Mexico and they are delicious. The ranch dressing is legendary.

You can check out the entire Follow Your Heart online here and tell them on Twitter how excited you are for these new products.

Extra note: Follow Your Heart are sponsors of Vegan Beer Fest UK taking place in London, Glasgow and Manchester. Click here to find tickets.

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Food is not porn

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Yesterday I wrote a blog post that got a HUGE amount of attention.

I posted about a new vegan pop-up cake business set to launch in east London called Vegan Sweet Porn. The photos were beyond impressive, almost to the point of looking too good to be true.

Well, guess what? It was too good to be true. It was pointed out to me by several readers that not only did the photos not belong to the business that sent them to me, the food in the photos was not even vegan.

This is certainly the worst possible start for a vegan food business. DO NOT send non-vegan food photos to a vegan blog, especially if you have stolen the photos from someone else. It is the wrong thing to do on multiple levels. People spend countless hours baking and photographing food. It is immensely unethical to use these photos without permission in an attempt to further your own business.

In addition, I was contacted by another reader named Yellow Dot Vegan who wanted to share some thoughts about how Vegan Sweet Porn uses pornography and sexualisation of food as a marketing tool.

I have been considering a blog post about the hyper-sexualisation of vegan food and the use of #veganfoodporn for a while now, but I’m more than happy to share this space with a reader who has expressed similar concerns.

You can can read Yellow Dot Vegan’s concerns and observations right now:

I have been thinking a lot over the past few days about how veganism and feminism sit alongside each other.

The East London pop-up SweetVeganPorn has caused quite a storm by using sexualised language to describe food (and using uncredited food photos from other blogs for promotion). When it was pointed out, the owner of the business was unwilling to see how the use of the term ‘porn’ and the sexualisation of food with comments like ‘please don’t go on like you ain’t just came in your pants’ would be alienating to many woman.

A number of women reached out to the owner via social media to explain how they were deeply uncomfortable with pornography terminology being used to sell food and that a business called VeganSweetPorn (no matter if the food is plant based) feels hostile to them. The response from the business owner was a lack of understanding, frustration, anger, plus a clear statement that ‘sex sells’.

Yes, sex does sell and there is no denying that many businesses have exploited women to sell their products.

The online argument continued with the business owner expressing the opinion that feminism isn’t relevant to veganism and therefore shouldn’t be used to critique a vegan business.

But veganism does align closely with feminism. It is about reducing the suffering of all animals (including females) and ensuring we fight against ill treatment and injustice.

Personally, I can’t understand how you can be a feminist and not be a vegan, but that is a matter for another time. Not all feminists agree on the damage that pornography does to women, but many do and there is a substantial amount of literature available that echoes this view. Regardless of the principles at play here, surely any business wanting to break into an industry of largely ‘ethical’ consumers needs to think carefully about the terminology they use to sell products? Even if they don’t care about being inclusive, they at least would want to appeal to the widest market possible.

Luckily, east London is awash with delicious vegan cake including two fantastic local vegan bakers tickling our taste buds without subjecting us to pornography terminology and the sexualisation of food. Tegan the Vegan & Heart of Cake provide us with treats on a weekly basis. You can find more details on Tegan on Facebook and Heart of Cake online and Instagram. Rest assured that ALL photos on these pages are of vegan food!

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