Post Punk Kitchen Forum

i always like raw sweets over gf sweets because often than not they are tastier. and by default raw stuff is also gf...i <3 me some raw cheeze cake!

Party at Poopies! We'll never be xPBx

I've never had a xgfx cupcake from an actual bakery, but i've had the Amy's cake and some of the Eat Pastry xgfx varities, and those are pretty good if not slightly grainy. One time I got a packaged cookie from I-don't-remember-the-brand, and I opened it in the car and took a bite and made a face and Brian was like, "What's wrong?" And I chewed a few times before sadly saying, "It tastes like sand!" It was awful and I don't think anyone would enjoy eating that. I think some companies just concern themselves with making something gluten-free and not tinkering around long enough to make sure that it's really GOOD.

Also, as a small town vegan, often it's easier to find something that's marketed towards GF people than it is something for vegans, which makes me extra stabby when those companies don't try to avoid other allergens. There are some nut crackers that look really good, but they're not vegan. It seems like all GF crackers that are vegan are nothing but flax. Pounds and pounds of flax.

I've never had the Amy's cake. The Eat Pastry cookies are ok though I think the texture is a little off, I want them to be chewier and less squishy I guess. I've definitely never had anything that compares to Back to Eden or Petunia's here in Portland. Back to Eden quietly went 100% gluten-free a while ago and it amazes me how many people didn't notice.

All of the Eat Pastry cookies come out that way, the only real difference i've noted is that the raw GF dough definitely tastes like chickpea flour (but I think that goes away after you bake them). The Amy's cake is almost just like the gluten-y one, just a little grainy. But still super moist god dammit i'm going to tell Brian to stop and bring me home a god damned cake.

Hey, I'd love to have a vegan bakery in my city. Or a vegan restaurant. Or more than one vegetarian restaurant in a city of more than 500 000 people. But I'm not complaining, I could be living in the country and not even have a decent supermarket or health food shops. And I'm oh-so-grateful I understand English as well as French, or I'd be stuck with abouth two blogs and four recipe books to choose from.

i think gf baking must be an artform unto itself just like vegan baking.

i tried making gf cupcakes twice for a friend who is gf and both times i didnt think they were great. more muffiny-like than cupcake like. they were good muffins though!
we went to Sweet Pea bakery when we were in PDX cause i was like AHHH WE HAVE TO GO TO THE VEGAN BAKERY WE DONT HAVE THESE AT HOME!!! and the cupcake i wanted also happened to be gf. i was really disappointed in it cause it was WICKED dry and not that great.

that being said ive had some vegan baked goods that were dry and not great too. 2 years in a row the receptionist at work was nice enough to go to WF for my birthday and get me a vegan cake for my birthday lunch. so super nice of her but the WF vegan cakes are really kind of dry and bleh. i feel like telling people "i could totally make you something better!!"

That's what I meant.

WF makes vegan cakes???

I used to see them occasionally when I lived in Dallas. But it was something like $25 for a 6" cake, so I never tried it. I did try a cupcake once, and it was shiitake - dry cake with greasy frosting. It was super disappointing (however, that was nearly 4 years ago in London, so your mileage may vary).

I've had mixed experiences with Whole Foods vegan cakes and cupcakes. Some are dry and crumbly, but I've had a few that were ultra moist and dense - like almost TOO dense. The dry ones are pretty meh but I like the dense ones, though I can't eat more than a small amount at one time or my stomach feels like it's going to explode.

the square pieces of WF vegan cake that they keep in the dessert case are usually great, but i haven't had good experiences with their whole cakes. when i was newly vegan, my parents bought me a vegan birthday cake from whole foods, and it was a big deal, because they never went to whole foods and they didn't know anything about vegan anything (i didn't know much myself yet). there was this whole big ta-da reveal and they were so happy about it, and then it was the worst forking cake ever. SO dry, SO heavy, the frosting was like dark chocolate paste . . . i could tell that they were putting on their brave, supportive, "shut up, it's her birthday" faces, but finally i just said something like, "gee, i wonder if this one was a little old?" and we all threw our forks down.

Yeah, the small vegan baked goods in their refrigerated dessert section is good and also not made by WF. I love the Moo Cluck Cluck pb filled cupcakes.

I think Poopie is too much of a southern gal to move to Seattle. On the other hand, Maryland is technically still the south, I think poopie would fit right in.

Poopie would love Seattle and we'd say y'all all the time just to make her feel at home!

Y'all!

Someone used my cast-iron to make grilled cheese. There are no fewer than four other cast-iron pans that would have worked fine and which I didn't buy specifically so I would be able to clean it without soap and not worry about cross contamination. :( :(

Poopie B - International Woman of Pastry

One of my biggest peeves is when people talk about the damage over cropping does, often singling out soy beans, and then blaming vegans and vegetarians for it.

Conveniently, they ignore the fact that 97% of the soy beans that are grown are fed to all the livestock.

I will move anywhere if someone else will pay my way, y'all!

No, no, clearly neither of you are familiar with my "conscription into vegan playdate" plan for PB in case we ever have to move to Millington, TN. I mean "hey, there's a person on the internet who lives within a hundred miles of there!" is, I'm not kidding, literally the best thing the place has going for it.

That is sadly true.

Re: WF vegan cake

I had a GREAT slice of chocolate cake at WF in Seattle. Like, it was so good I ate it for dinner two nights in a row. But I've had chocolate cake from the WF here in Sacramento, and it's only okay. Passable, but a little dry. My boss bought me one for my birthday last year and nobody ate it except me. I probably still have slices of that cake in the back of my freezer.

The WF cupcakes I have tried were nasty. But I never cared for store cake anyway...