yawn! i usually don’t post on saturday morning, but as of today, there are finally vegan donuts in los angeles and that is so worth writing about at this dreadful hour! intelligentsia in silver lake has started selling dee’s nuts donuts and i can’t get enough.

dee's nuts vegan donut with chocolate frosting and purple sprinkles. yum.

it’s about fucking time vegan donuts made their way to los angeles. i mean, jeez, we have a gazzilion vegan restaurants, vegan cupcakes, vegan cookies, and (my fave) vegan twinkies, but no vegan donuts. …UNTIL NOW.

today, it seems that dee’s nuts donuts, a vegan donut brand has shot up overnight and started offering a line of baked goods at the very popular intelligentsia coffee shop in silver lake. dee’s nuts is a one-woman, animal-free donut company (she doesn’t advertise her goods as vegan, because the v word makes flesh-eaters recoil in horror) who has has been getting quite the buzz in the vegan community and causing a stir among herbivores on twitter.

dee’s nuts treats have been available for private order through her website for quite awhile. but today for the first time, they made their debut on the los angeles restaurant scene. since silver lake seems to have the most vegan restaurants per capita, it seems fitting that vegan donuts would first show up at a trendy sunset junction coffee shop.

intelligentsia is known for its superior coffee, tea, and pastries. how awesome is it that thanks to dee’s nuts, vegans from all of la county have a huge reason to visit there now.

vegan donuts at intelligentsia. $2.50 each.

glazed and chocolate-coconut are both delicious.

dee’s nuts creates a line of super fresh donuts, baked right in our own downtown los angeles, that taste authentic and sinful just like the real thing. plump, porous, juicy cake deep fried and covered in thick and creamy frosting make for absolute decadence. and at only $2.50 a pop, they are very reasonably priced, and give you an excuse to buy several.

because they aren’t advertised as vegan, i know that SO MANY omnivores will order these donuts and think they are “real.” muahahahahhahahahahahaha.

la vegans, get over to intelligentsia and buy some donuts. right now they only have one dozen per day. i got my silly ass there at 6am on a saturday and heard that other people had been calling about them as well. considering there are no other vegan donuts in town, i’d act fast and buy ‘em whenever the fuck you can.

i was so stoked when i heard about these vegan donuts, that i couldn’t even wait for them to become available in stores. lucky for me, deanna of dee’s nuts invited me to her kitchen yesterday and gave me a quick tour, as well as a piping-hot donut fresh off the press. you can order your own batch through her website, and i highly recommend doing so, even if its just to be able to taste a donut moments after its been made. check out this cell phone picture i snapped of the vegan donut maker:

this is where vegan donuts come from.

i know, i know. i am very lucky.

dee’s nuts donuts also made a smaller debut today at fix coffee in echo park. fix has already been offering cookies baked by dee’s nuts, and as of today they will be selling donuts too. if you can stomach it, i would recommend getting to fix and trying the cookies out as well. there is a freshly-baked chocolate chip cookie that is melty and out of this world, along with a thick spongy sugar cookie slathered in creamy frosting. these treats are also not advertised as vegan, and they are tasty enough to fool anybody.

vegan sugar cookie. $2.50 and vegan chocolate chip cookie. $2.25

i will keep you posted as these baked goods and donuts become available in more locations. now that i’ve had vegan donuts in la, i definitely don’t want them to go away.

oh yeah, and dee’s nuts! lol.

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as of yesterday, there’s one more reason to love cafe muse in hollywood. not only do they have breakfast daily, a great vegan selection of wraps, delicious sandwiches and huge, hearty build-your-own salads; but now they sell no whey VEGAN CUPCAKES! i don’t know of anywhere else in hollywood i can get vegan cupcakes, and this place happens to be like 5 feet from my work. 

chocolate and vanilla vegan cupcakes. $3.25 each.

cafe muse sells both chocolate and vanilla cupcakes, and both flavors are out of this world. i bought one for my omnivorous friend, and she just couldn’t believe they were vegan. she said the actual cake bit tasted way better than any she’d ever tried before, and the frosting was just as rich and creamy as on other cupcakes.

i would have to agree with her. these cupcakes were just as good as the ones i used to get from leda’s bakeshop in the valley, which has closed to the public and is only taking special orders. it’s so great to have top notch vegan cupcakes again, and right here in hollywood!

no whey, the vegan baking company that makes these cupcakes, is owned by jenn shaggy, the maker of the famous los angeles vegan twinkies. her twinkies have gained a lot of local press, and i can say her cupcakes are just as good.

so hollywood vegans, rejoice! cafe muse has super awesome vegan cupcakes. go check out this cafe if you haven’t already. they have a ton of great food and now some really tasty desserts.

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for so long i have been on the hunt for vegan soft serve. when i was 12 years old, i took a 2 week trip to the uk and lived off a glorious and ubiquitous brand of ice cream called mr. whippy. at least two cones per day maintained my mandatory 7th grade sugar high and kept me happy & full of energy. it was similar to mcdonalds soft serve, but 1000x better. creamy and sweet, white frozen matter swirled into a magical and delicate-about-to-melt dessert. totally heavenly. since becoming a vegan 4 years ago, i have found nothing that comes even close. sure, we have soy dream, tofutti and the marvelous scoops. but none have that good old-fashioned soft serve quality.

that is…until now. thanks to my trusty tipsters liz (¡yo soy!) and sunny, i found that hugo’s tacos in atwater village offers a vegan soft serve that can scratch my itch. rich, creamylicious, and double-flavored, this chocolate-caramel soft serve makes me feel like i’m eating that old familiar fast food ice cream.

caramel and chocolate vegan soft serve.

the soft serve at hugo’s tacos was nothing to be scoffed at. rich and decadent, flavorful and tasty; i couldn’t ask for much more. they shun the classic vanilla flavor for the more adventurous caramel, but other than that, this treat is just the way you remember it. the choice between 2 flavors, or a decadent swirl means i WON’T be disappointed! PLEASE NOTE, this freez-a-licious awesomeness is only available at the atwater village location. sorry valley-dwellers, you will have to make the trek to hipsterville for this treat.

next up, hugo’s tacos offers up more for vegans than just ice cream and mexican food. they also have the newly-introduced burger. while it’s nothing to get too excited about, the hugo’s tacos burger is a fucking steal for the price. juicy, flavorful and filling, it is incredible…albeit a bit on the small side.

veggie burger: griddle-cooked and finished. served with lettuce, tomato and special sauce. plus french fries...not much extra $!

now, strict-ish vegans like myself beware: the veggie burger by default comes with a chipotle honey sauce. opt for it without the sauce if that offends you, and the burger is every bit if not EVEN MORE tasty. for a crappy, under 5 bucks with fries “taco stand” burger, i was quite impressed. this dish doesn’t look like much, but it actually tasted pretty fucking nice. good sauce and a well-grilled patty on a scrummy bun—what more do i need? considering the hours and price of this joint, my fellow vegans, you couldn’t do much better.

lastly, let’s not forget the actual TACOS at hugo’s tacos! modest little corn tortillas layered and topped with incredible vegan offerings and freshly made salsa. yum! this time i got the soyrizo filling with the salsa negra. super hot, smokey seasoning along with delectable fake mexi-meat made this a taco to be remembered. yeah, it was small…but the crazy flavors made up for it. plus, this taco clocked in with tons of taste at under 3 bucks, and at the time, i was at the time saving myself for the more exciting and more difficult-to-come-by soft serve.

taco with soyrizo and salsa negra. $2.75

the mini taco was small, yet savory. considering you could get a portion for six bucks large enough to feed a horse, i was quite happy to settle on the little size. i left hugo’s feeling full and glad to have been there, not stuffed and remorseful. at under $12, this 3 course meal for 2 (although we shared a bit) proved to be good food for good prices, without a shred of regret.

not to mention the outdoor seating and kickass friendly service. if you haven’t been, you need to check out the hugo’s tacos in atwater village. this HT beats it’s sister stand in studio city, purely because of the vegan soft serve option. they seem to have a bigger menu as well, although i could be wrong because maybe the valley branch has expanded and i just don’t know about it.

hugo's tacos in atwater village.

some ungrateful hipsters have torn this place to shreds on yelp, but seriously, pay them no heed. they are only bitching because hugo’s costs maybe a buck more per dish than the scary roach coaches filled with lard that they are used to. imho, hugo’s tacos is WELL WORTH IT.

long story short: haul your ass east and get some fucking great vegan mexican food, burgers, fries, and soft serve. your inner-junk-food fiend will LOVE you for it!

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what self-respecting, sweets-lovin’ vegan doesn’t go nuts over the thought of VEGAN CUPCAKES!!?? i know i do. and since leda’s bakeshop in los angeles has practically shut down, i’ve been fiending for my next vegan cupcake fix. that’s why when in nyc, i absolutely had to check out manhattan’s famous vegan bakery, babycakes! i sure wasn’t disappointed.

cookies 'n cream frosted cupcake: $3.95

for my cupcake choice, i went with a chocolate cake topped of with cookies ‘n cream frosting. it was out of this world. the cupcake sure wasn’t as pretty or daintily decorated as the ones over at leda’s, but it tasted even better. the frosting was by far the best part, being rich, creamy, and full of little chocolate chunks. the cake was moist and decadent as well…i seriously could have eaten like 5 of these. so friggin’ delicious.

best frosting ever.

i happened to be at babycakes on halloween, so they had a selection of ghoulish goodies for sale as well. i decided to buy a variation of the chocolate chip cookie sandwich with orange frosting and the word “BOO” written on it.

chocolate chip cookie sandwich, halloween style! $4.25

the cookie sandwich was even more scrumptious than the cupcake and filled with so much sticky-gooey frosting. i loved every last bite. seriously, i can’t figure out how they get a frosting with no eggs and no dairy to taste so damn rich and creamy.

the cookies themselves were incredible as well. crunchy on the outside, soft and moist on the inside, and littered with almost-melting chocolate morsels. by far the best cookie sandwich i’ve ever had. now if only they sold a version with soy ice cream in the middle. mmmm.

i can’t wait to get back to nyc and eat at babycakes again and again. rumor has it they are even gonna open one in los angeles, right here in our very own weho! i hope that happens sooner rather than later. i don’t think i can wait.

everything i tried at babycakes was off the chain and worth raving about. although their treats are pretty expensive, they make up for it with healthier, natural, organic and VEGAN ingredients along with a tastiness that is unmatched. yum. yum. yum.

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well, leda’s vegan cupcakes are kinda no more…is what i meant to say. leda’s bake shop, famous for their irresistible vegan cupcakes, has officially closed its storefront as of october 19, 2008. the modest bakery located in sherman oaks bills the shutdown as “great news” and details their “exciting new plans” on their website. according to leda’s, the bake shop can’t “divulge the specifics,” but is “undergoing some exciting changes and developing an innovative new concept to meet the growing needs of our large and loyal following.” hmmmm. i guess it’s just a coincidence that the economy is in the toilet, and this small eco-friendly bakery in the valley is closing their doors for undisclosed reasons. i don’t mean to sound cynical, don’t get me wrong, i hope leda’s is planning a huge comeback that will knock all our vegan socks off. for now though, it looks like they may be going through hard times.

upon hearing the sad news, i absolutely had to get in there on leda’s last day in business (saturday october 18) and buy as many cookies and cupcakes as me and poor, supportive omnivore parents could possibly eat.

all the flavors i could possibly eat! $1.50 each.

the vegan cupcakes were absolutely to die for. of the flavors i purchased were chocoate chocolate, chocolate peanut butter, chocolate espresso, velvet and coconut. i got the miniature cupcakes so we could try as many as possible, and every flavor was absolutely divine! i didn’t even get a chance to try them all, my parents and husband were all over these little decadent devils. of the ones i tried, the chocolate espresso, and my old favorite chocolate chocolate stood out.

chocolate espresso cupcake

chocolate chocolate cupcake

it’s a shame this place is gonna stop selling life-changing vegan cupcakes to passerbys like me. i’m half thinking of renewing my vows or throwing a meaningless party, so i can get leda’s to cater my event.

just because i had to, i also stocked up on some chocolate chip cookies before i left leda’s. this little bag was waaaaay too expensive at over five bucks, but i just had to indulge. i mean, what if they completely go out of business? i would spend the rest of my life in regret over these cookies, right? i wasn’t about to let that happen.

not quite as pretty, but just as delicious as the cupcakes, the cookies were gone in absolute record time. the chocolate chips were moist, and the dough was perfectly baked and greasy. i’m glad these were so small, it made me feel much better about the fact that i ate four of them.

ahhhh. leda’s bake shop has long been one of los angeles’ favorite vegan-friendly spots. everyone loves vegan cupcakes, and it’s so sad to see them scale back their service.

last day rush for leda's cupcakes and cookies

if you take one thing from this post….for crimony’s sake, cater your next party with leda’s. or, if you feel like squandering some cash or are super hungry, spurge for 24 cupcakes, which is leda’s new minimum order. it’s a small price to pay to keep this modest vegan staple in business. and you know i’m right.

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update! since the time of this post, these amazing chocolate twinkies are available for order from no whey vegan bakery. i highly suggest you get a batch! now, read on…

i absolutely love chocolate. it’s the best. if i see a chocolate dessert, it takes every bit of will power i have not to devour it. i’m pretty glad to be a vegan, meaning i can’t eat most of the tempting chocolate treats that i encounter in day to day life. because if i could, i’d be a hell of a lot fatter.

i also love vegan twinkies. so imagine how excited i was to learn last week that la’s most famous vegan twinkie baker, jenn shaggy had whipped up a special batch of her legendary treats in double chocolate flavor. yep, chocolate cake and chocolate frosting…my dream come true. i booked it to the vegan spot to pick up some of the goods as soon as i could, and while i do love everything on the vegan spot’s menu, this time i was just coming for twinkies. they were even better than i could have imagined.

double chocolate vegan twinkies

i was lucky enough to be handed a box of 5 beautiful chocolate vegan twinkies by the gifted baker herself and i couldn’t help but ask how the hell she does it. she wouldn’t let me in on the secret twinkie recipe, but she did tell me that she loves experimenting with flavors making different style twinkies for all occasions. a wizard in the kitchen at only 23 years old, i’m really hoping jenn shaggy opens up her own restaurant some day. from twinkies to dorritos, she has figured out a way to make anything vegan. i highly recommend checking out her blog, where she shares a few of her recipes.

back to the twinkies. they were off the hook. they didn’t taste anything like limp, packaged twinkies from when i was a kid…instead they tasted like the most decadent chocolate cake filled up with creamy sinful frosting. they were so delicious that my husband refused to believe they were vegan, i mean they were just too incredibly rich.

chocolate frosting holes

the frosting was even better than the stuff in jenn’s normal vegan twinkies, which are delicious as well. but what can i say, i am obsessed with chocolate. i highly recommend that if you are lucky enough to get your hands on one of these, you have a full glass of soy milk at your side. the cake is just so moist and flavorful, each bite goes down well with a cold sip of vanilla milk.

they don’t photograph quite as well as normal twinkies, especially when cut in half because it’s brown frosting against brown cake. but trust me, what they lack in looks they more than make up for in taste! i munched down three in one sitting and then had to stop myself. a very fortunate co-worker was given a bite of my twinkie (i only had 5, it’s not like i could spare a whole one) and i didn’t tell her it was vegan until she had already raved about how awesome it was. a testament to the twinkie.

so, go to the vegan spot and get some twinkies! now! they are awesome. and be sure to try whatever flavors you can. the standard ones are delicious, but not nearly as savory as these chocolate babies. and keep track of jenn as well, who knows where her desserts will show up, and you gotta be there to try them.

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last week i turned 24, and while to me getting older is a kinda depressing thought, i took it as an excuse to completely gorge myself on vegan cake.

chocolate & peanut butter cake from real food daily! (i dunno how much it cost 'cause it was a gift)

i haven’t had a birthday cake since i was 18…back in the day when i was still a vegetarian. i used to love the gooey dribbling frosting and moist chocolate sponginess—all stuff i’ve half-way written off since becoming a vegan. luckily for me, i have the most awesome co-workers who went out of their way to surprise me with a delicious vegan cake from real food daily and 3 bottles of specialty beer. what a gesture!

the cake was out of this world. everyone in the office was going at it, and nobody had a problem with the fact it was vegan. in fact, the cake was GONE, no leftovers, in like 30 minutes. usually we order cake from sweet lady jane’s, and when we do, a few slices always get thrown out. not with the real food daily cake, uh uh. people were coming over from different departments, wishing me a happy birthday just so they could sleaze away with a slice of me cake! it was great watching omnivores enjoying the vegan dessert. and trust me, i got plenty of it to myself—two big slices that sent me into a food coma and rendered me useless for the rest of the day. mmm. chocolate-peanut-buttery goodness.

yummmmmmmmy cake.

i know we at quarrygirl have had some unkind things to say about real food daily in the past (sometimes they blow), but none of those feelings spill over into my review of their cake. i don’t really know how expensive this was because it was a surprise, and i don’t know how the service was because i didn’t pick it up…but i DO know that my bday cake tasted incredible and looked beautiful. people were questioning, “how do they make it so soft and moist?”, “are you sure this doesn’t have eggs in it?”, “omg how do they make this taste just like real cake?” and then it was all gone. and everyone was full.

i highly recommend real food daily for a stellar, tasty birthday cake. i may even have to give them another shot and eat there again.

and a big shout out to the peeps who bought me this cake. if you ever read this, you rule!

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on my recent trip to florida, i ate at a ton of cool veg restaurants, but none of them compared to the vegan perfection i would find at SUBLIME. actually, nowhere i’ve ever been compares to sublime, a high-class vegan eatery in ft. lauderdale, florida that boasts numerous celebrity patrons, including paul mccartney. i can safely say it is there that i ate the best meal i’ve ever had, and the owner wasn’t lying when she stopped by our table and assured us, “there’s nowhere like sublime in the entire united states.”

i could tell the moment i walked into the entirely vegan restaurant and saw the fancy interior complete with waterfalls, the neatly dressed staff and enormous bar that i was somewhere special. i would have to treat myself to a full on slap-up meal consisting of an aperitif, an appetizer, two entrees (to be shared by me & my husband), and dessert. so that’s just what i did.

(i apologize in advance for the dark photos in this post. sublime is a classy joint with dim lights, not ideal for taking pix that are up to snuff. you will have to believe me when i say these snapshots don’t do the food justice.)

before we even ordered, our fabulous waiter showed up at our table with a small plate of complimentary pesto polenta. i knew we were off to a good start. it, of course, was delicious.

pesto polenta, on the house!

for my pre-meal cocktail, i ordered a mojito—this is florida, after all, and drinking anything else would be a crime. it was cool and refreshing. sweet and minty. ahh.

minty-licious mojito $8

now, let’s get TASTY. sublime offers a pretty big appetizer menu and all of it sounds good, but one dish in particular caught my attention: sublime sliders.

sublime sliders: cheddar, seitan steak, onion, romaine, gherkin, special sauce. $12

i see people chomping on these mini burgers in bars all the time—a common happy hour food, most weekends i find myself 3 stools away from a plate of sliders and an endless stream of bud light. being super into vegan burgers, i’ve daydreamed from time to time about creating my own cruelty-free slider recipe. unfortunately, it all falls apart when i think about forming and baking miniature buns, or getting the itsy-bitsy patties just right. luckily for me, sublime took care of all that for me. i finally know what it’s like to eat a slider…fucking awesome. if there was a vegan heaven, god would serve sublime’s sliders nightly hourly.

after devouring my shameless, hamburger-emulating appetizer, i knew sublime was ready to bring it—i had to order some entrees that would be difficult to veganize; stuff normally reserved for omnivores. after those sliders, i had a feeling sublime would be up for the challenge.

what better way to start than with a quiche? upon googling a quiche recipe, the first result i found called for 4 eggs, 1 cup of half & half, 1/2 cup of real mayonnaise, and 8 ounces of cheddar cheese. yep, it could skate by as vegetarian, but the quiche contains all the vegan’s worst enemies. how could any fine restaurant possibly create one that i could actually eat? i dunno. but sublime sure as fuck did.

tuscan quiche: tofu, “mozzarella”, roasted shallots, wood-fired artichokes, braised spinach, roasted red bliss potatoes, seasonal vegetables. $16

this quiche was off the chain: delicious, soft, melty and moist. each bite was an explosion of creamy flavor. the order also came complete with sinful oily leafy greens and perfectly grilled potatoes. i’ve never had such a perfect replication of cheese, milk and eggs all in one. this tasted REAL, sans the cruelty and dead shit. give me any omnivore, and i guarantee they would believe they were eating the bloody puss-filled dairy products they are used to. i mean this all in a good way. there is NO reason not to be vegan.

next up, the even bigger test…PIZZA. other than tomato joe’s, nobody has made a vegan pizza that i’m totally impressed with. i knew that if sublime was on point, they’d be able to pull a out a decent vegan pizza. of course, they did.

margherita classico: tomato, fresh basil, soy mozzarella. $12

sublime’s vegan pizza is unique, because it doesn’t contain the crappy over-used follow your heart cheese that runs rampant here in los angeles. being a vegan cheese fanatic, i can swear that sublime’s cheese substitute tastes just like TEESE…a tasty brand that doesn’t get nearly enough attention. beyond taste, the sublime pizza’s cheese had an ever-so-slight pinkish tinge to it, another teese characteristic. of course, it was delectable. it’s so refreshing to eat vegan pizza in a restaurant, free of follow your heart’s impudent and never-melting fake cheese. this stuff was gooey and stringy, melty-licious and unruly…almost just like real cheese. a definite winner. cooked more like a fancy italian restaurant pizza, this isn’t your huge take-out, tv dinner pie. instead, sublime serves their dusty pizza on a thinner crust, with decorative garnishes and fresh light ingredients. the presentation, exquisite taste and top-notch fake cheese make this pizza an A+++++++++++++.

after eating away and sipping cocktails into oblivion, my husband and i agreed that this was, without a doubt, the best dinner ever. sublime was truly the most special, wonderful, magical place that we’d ever eaten. there is absolutely no way we could pass up on dessert. it just wouldn’t be right, to us, and ESPECIALLY to you!

being a choc-o-holic, i chose the chocolate nirvana cake with ice cream on the side. never before has being a vegan felt so decadent and delicious.

chocolate nirvana: milk chocolate, kahlua butter creme, dark chocolate ganache. $11

this cake was better than any crappy vegetarian cake i’ve ever eaten. i think whoever made it possesses secret powers. seriously, it was soooo luscious. the frosting was rich and creamy, the cake itself was moist, and it came with a huge piece of chocolate candy that was sumptuous. it totally had me scraping the plate and licking the fork. even my husband, mr. “i don’t like sweet stuff” was all over it. best dessert ever. wow.

my experience proves that only one word can describe sublime: perfect. this place is amazing, and the only thing i hate about it is that it’s located so far away from me. it’s absolutely superb—i recommend if you visit florida, or any of the surrounding states for that matter, you do whatever it takes to have dinner at sublime. it will be worth your while. i’m looking into booking another trip to florida ASAP just to eat there again.

best food. killer atmosphere. huge selection. what more do we vegans require? plus, the rock star on my banner eats there. go there. it will be so fucking tasty!

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