I chose last year to relocate (once again) to Europe instead of choosing to remain in Australia. I choose not to buy or consume dairy products due of the mistreatment of animals exploited within the industry. Furthermore, I often choose to overeat sweet food because I’m a greedy fat, gay vegan.
These three choices of European living, dairy-free food and sugar over-consumption have recently merged into some sort of holy trinity of choice with the discovery of a delicious chocolate caramel product called Choices. See what I did there?
Following weeks of planning (mostly me harassing people via Twitter), the London Vegan Potluck took place last night. It was a fabulous success.
London Vegan Potluck in Brixton
Held at the Ms. Cupcake store in Brixton, the potluck brought together vegans and non-vegans from all over London in a celebration of vegan food, vegan beer and fantastic people. Approximately 25 people gathered to try out dishes and drink beer kindly supplied by the good folk at Freedom Brewery.
The evening was a true community event. Old friends caught up and new friendships were cemented.
The selection of food on offer was wonderfully-diverse. Sweet cakes sat beside pasta specialties. Exotic salads jostled for attention with hearty stews. The choices were mind-boggling.
Here is a quick post to get you over the midweek blues and get you ready for the weekend.
Regular readers will be all too familiar with my love affair with 222 Veggie Vegan, a superb vegan eatery located on North End Road in West Kensington. You will have read about my first visit here and probably also saw my detailing of a subsequent visit here. Now let us return once again to discover what my favourite London restaurant has on offer for weekend brunch.
Pizza is a treat not often on offer to vegans. Most mainstream, mass-produced pizzas are heaped with dairy cheese and/or contain animal fats within their dough bases. Vegans have for a long time been excluded from this common snack, but there are more than a few places on the planet where you can get a nice slice free from non-human animal content.
One of my favourite restaurants in the world is the gorgeous and quaint Threeworlds Organic Cafeon the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. This low key location sells the most delicious and nutritious pizzas I have tasted. Cruzer Pizza in Los Angeles has mastered the art of copying firm favourites such as meat lovers without hurting anyone. The Grove Cafe in Leeds, UK offers up a selection of pizzas topped with Vegerella vegan cheese. All of these restaurants have the good stuff, but I have always struggled to locate a pizza without cruelty in London. That was until Franco Manca came into my life.
Kensington High Street in West London is a shopper’s paradise. Huge department stores coexist alongside snappy boutiques and regular town street stores. If you have money to spend, Kensington High Sreet and its inhabitants will gladly assist you in removing a lot from your wallet.
But it isn’t just clothing and accessories on offer to tempt eager consumers along this famous shopping strip. Vegan foodies will be delighted to learn of a sophisticated eatery serving up 100% plant-based fare. It is called Saf.
The UK is alive with excitement. The sun is out in full force, the temperature is rising and people are wearing a lot less clothing. I arrived in a bustling, blistering Leeds today just in time for a long, long weekend and I’m more than ready to have a good time. I’m sure you know nothing says ‘good time’ quite like vegan cider and the vegan cider is better still when it is strawberry-flavoured and in a can.
Here is some excellent news to get you over those midweek blues.
Freedom Brewery is a fabulous producer of lager and beer operating out of Staffordshire, UK. They have been supplying drinkers with outstanding beverages since 1995 and all of their products are certified by the Vegan Society as suitable for a vegan diet. A little while ago, I published a short review of their lager and I have been enjoying this drink ever since I put that story out.
Slip your pleather shoes on, grab your Oyster card and get to Brixton as soon as you can. Vegan baking superstar Ms. Cupcake is now tempting your cruelty-free taste buds with donuts. Get them while they’re hot.
If you recall my last post about Ms. Cupcake, you will already know about the staggering range of vegan cupcakes they produce. The bakery is the first of its kind in London and is fast becoming a favourite destination for their many loyal customers. The cupcakes are certainly delicious enough to warrant a visit, but now Ms. Cupcake offers even more treats to entice in the form of donuts.
London offers visitors and residents a wide array of stunning locations, sights and attractions. If you are looking for an informative, entertaining or fun-packed day out in the capital, the city always has something to please.
I love a good day out at a historical London location and even more so when vegan snacks and drinks are available. I was satisfied on all levels during a recent trip to the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
The Internet has been ablaze the last few days with heated debate. Vegan-aimed magazine VegNews has been exposed by blogger Quarrygirl for printing digitally-altered photographs of meals made using dead animals and presenting them as visual accompaniments to vegan recipes. The outcry from long-term and casual VegNews readers has been overwhelming, while a substantial amount of readers don’t seem to be offended much at all.
I am outraged as a vegan, but I’m about to take you on a different journey. My rant is not one simply of distress at having been fooled into looking at murdered animals while being tricked into thinking they look tasty. No, I am approaching the VegNews fiasco from a broader angle of certain misrepresentation and possible deceitful provision of product/services.
Back in the day, the early 90s to be more precise, I was a teenager madly into music. Madonna seductively clung to my bedroom walls, Public Enemy powerfully educated me via my stereo and Morrissey practically insisted I do nothing for days on end but listen to his releases. I knew what made me happy and I always got what I paid for. The same couldn’t be said for some of my friends.
One of my best friends was a guy named Glen Fox. Glen was the one in our gang who somehow always managed to be a bit behind the 8 ball. His taste in music was certainly eclectic. I recall music shopping with Glen on the day he bought a Milli Vanilli CD. I was vile and teased him mercilessly. You can imagine my sheer delight when the entire Milli Vanilli act turned out to be a sham and the two ‘lead singers’ (Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus) hadn’t contributed in any way to their Grammy Award-winning recordings.
I promise this story is going somewhere other than affording me the opportunity of getting another kick into poor Foxy. The Milli Vanilli case turned into a media storm of epic proportions. The band was stripped of its Grammy award, dropped by its label and subjected to ferocious hounding by the press. Class action lawsuits were filed across the US and a rebate scheme was devised wherein consumers were given an opportunity to claim back a percentage of the cost of Milli Vanilli CDs, cassettes, records and concert tickets.
Glen Fox was sad and dejected as he applied for some of his expenditure back. Milli Vanilli‘s management and record label conceded consumers were justified in believing the music videos, album sleeves and promotional appearances showed the two lead singers of the band, when in fact Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus hadn’t sung a note. Some money was returned to consumers because what was presented as a legitimate product was in fact fabricated, untrue and dishonest.
I understand my Milli Vanilli analogy was a tad wordy but I believe it hammers home the message rather clearly. When people are in a video mouthing along to lyrics and posing on album covers, consumers understandably imagine they are the legitimate performers. They have the right to demand an explanation and perhaps compensation when it is proven to be a false representation.
Enter VegNews. When a colour photograph is nestled beside a vegan recipe within a market-leading vegan magazine, readers will assume the photo is free of animal products. The visual and written texts, VegNews’ billing as a vegan magazine and the publishers wish to be known as “the best meat-free reading you’ll find anywhere” all combine to suggest that the paying reader is purchasing photos of cruelty-free meals. With no disclaimer stating otherwise, VegNews has for years presented its content as something it clearly isn’t.
Milli Vanilli were stripped of awards and companies that profited from the deception apologised publicly and profusely before offering partial rebates to disgruntled consumers. VegNews has offered an explanation for their practice but no apology and, so far, no talk of compensation for loyal consumers who have paid money for a product that isn’t what they were led to believe.
