Moving & Ode to Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar Testing

Behold, Irish Whiskey Cremes

I hope you can handle this oncoming sweet food porn extravaganza. I hope you like cookies.

It's time to collect the photos and memories of the past two years' worth of recipe testing for the latest Post Punk Kitchen authors classic: Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar

by Isa Chandra Moskowtiz and Terry Hope Romero.

Testing for this book happened along with testing for Vegan Brunch, and I'm currently testing for Isa's current project, a weight loss cookbook! Go figure, after cupcakes and cookies.

I adored recipe testing once again for these ladies, and bombarding everyone I know with cookies during the process. Check out the cute tester photos in the back! Not mine, I totally missed the thread on this possibility, or you would have seen one of my cats sniffing a cookie...

White Chocolate Chip and Cranberry Biscotti

Once again, the Irish Whiskey Cremes

Linzertorte Thumbprints

These are near and dear to me and Evan.

Also, a catalyst in my-possibly-being-allergic-to-hazelnuts-worries...

Chocolate Chip Cookies (with vegan white chocolate chips)

And that's it!

Please head to my new domain GetSconedPDX.com for the rest of the testing photos!

I'll pop on here a couple more times to post its activity. I prefer the layout and usability wordpress offers, and never imagined I would be kicking myself so hard, for so many years, for picking this current address. But hey, people found it and hopefully you'll keep reading my posts at their new home!

Thank you!!!

Please bookmark my new site: GetSconedpdx.com

More...Vegan....Donuts

I know, right?

All the way in far out SE Portland....er, SE 29th and Powell, across from Hopworks Urban Brewery.

In a strip mall! The location warmed my suburban raised, all-vegan heart.

Not a far off walk in my neck of the woods. Acme Donuts apparently realized most of their donuts were nearly vegan, so they went for it. There were at least six different types of vegan donuts on their shelves, it seemed like 3/4 of their offerings were marked vegan.

I went with Maple Glazed and Berry Filled. Honestly, all their donuts were cute but were flatter than you normally see, like, almost deflated. I was raised on big, bold Dunkin Donuts in New York, and yeah, I measure everything against 'em. But hey, I dig homemade, cute's good.

Maple Glazed and Berry Filled.

The Berry filled was dusted with a coat of powdered sugar and lightly filled with a moist, sherbert-like berry filling. Personally, I'm not enthusiastic for jelly donuts and I remember eating around the filling as a child when faced with one. My favorite part here was the filling. Yes, sherbert-like: it wasn't stuffed with jam or crappy jelly, but a dollop of creamed jam? Something like that. I liked it. See below!

The dough looked like it was going to have some spice, such as cinnamon or nutmeg, in it, but I didn't taste any. That would have been something! It tasted more like an airy, soft roll than a donut, to be honest.

Fortunately, not greasy or yeasty, two things vegan donuts can be guilty of.

The maple glazed had a similar dough feel and taste, but the icing was delightful. Just look at that thick, maple icing. I mean, put that on pizza and someone would eat it.

Berry.

I know, I like to picture Portland as all parks and coffeeshops, but it can look like this!

Look for a full review in the future on Stumptown Vegans, after our resident donut expert stops by, too!

PSA: It's Pumpkin Milkshake Season at Sip.

Sip, Portland's organic juice and smoothie cart, has one last thing to say before it retires its milkshake machine for the winter:

PUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKIN

PUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKIN

PUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKINPUMPKIN

I went with some friends after lunch at Green Wok, and it was one of the most delicious and filling afternoons of my life. My third visit to Green Wok so far!

Our friend, Sip.

I assume they'll be making the switch to my beloved tea lattes again. Please.

Matcha Green Tea Latte

Squash land outside People's Coop!

Roast, Roast, Roast.

New in PDX: Back to Eden Vegan Bakery Boutique!

Yo! I've moved to a new domain:

getsconedpdx.com

It has pages of information, in addition to normal posts! Oh my gosh!

Please update your bookmarks.

<3

jess sconed.

I love this scone.

Maple Walnut Scone

ZOMG, right? Back to Eden Bakery has opened it's cozy and super adorable storefront & boutique on NE Alberta! It's located right next to Townsend Teahouse (vegan bubble tea, anyone? made with actual tea!) and the adjacent cart lot currently housing the all vegan Open Heart Cafe and Homegrown Smoker BBQ*.

I've taken two visits since they opened last Tuesday, and I'm all smiles in there. Everyone is! You can just feel how proud the staff is of the storefront. There are baked goods, bulk candy, Temptation soft serve, vegan products, cookbooks, Oregon's own Coconut Bliss scoops, Oogave ice cream floats and Cellar Door Coffee - a favorite local roaster.

That scone above? It starred one of my favorite flavors in the world, maple, and was such a precious, sweet scone. I brought it home for breakfast with my semi weekly morning coffee and it could very well be the best thing about this past week. I mean, I wanted to hug the bite I dipped into my coffee. But I didn't.

Pumpkin Bar

The very first baked good I tried from Back to Eden was the pumpkin bar above. I considered cake and pie, but the pan of pumpkin bars on the bottom of the main case called out to me. The classic crumbly, slightly salty topping, a thin layer of rich pumpkin, and crust = instant favorite. And reasonably priced and portioned, at $1.75 or so.

Crowd on Last Thursday

Inside the case:

My friend Millie dug her slice of Chocolate Rosemary Sea Salt Tart

Wall seating

Muffins & Scones Case

Karla had a Temptation sundae with Dandies Marshmallows and house caramel sauce. I think her sugar high lasted for hours. Maeve and I stopped by earlier today for soft serve with caramel sauce, and I'm still buzzing sweetness. Temptation soft serve is sa-weet! Seriously though - vegan soft serve on Alberta!!

Karla's sundae

The marshmallows remind me of how a local ice cream shop would stuff a mallow at the bottom of waffle cones when I was little and my sister and I were always delighted to find it...and at the savvy...

Back to Eden's own Janessa, and Lucas outside the boutique

* Side note, HGS is moving a few blocks east to 27th& Alberta in the old Spud Locker location next week. Can we discuss how NE Alberta officially has a vegan walking tour now? When I moved to the Alberta District in 2004, I would go to Vita and the Coop, and then the Coop and Vita. Granted, I lived there for two weeks and then fell into SE Portland love.

NE Alberta vegan highlights:

• Lunch at Homegrown Smoker Vegan BBQ - my pick is the combo with chronic tempeh, smoked soy curls, mac & cheese and add the fabulous smoked corn.
• Vegan shoe shopping (or realistically, show window shopping) at Pie Footwear at 29th.
• Grilled vegan cheese sandwiches with roasted jalapenos in trippy The Grilled Cheese Grill school bus
• Chicken Fried Tempeh at Vita
• Tempeh topped pizza slices at Bella Faccia
• Mason Jars full of booze or the Floor Punch at the Bye & Bye all vegan bar. Oh, and BBQ Platters (sub brussels for the collards!), one of my favorite things to eat in PDX, hands down. Meatball subs, Eastern Bowls with Peanut sauce and more.
• Coming Soon: The All Vegan Held Belts storefront!
• and Goodies *and* Cellar Door Coffee at Back to Eden, of course
• Tour de Crepes - I wasn't wild about the crepes here a few years ago, but I hear they've gotten great!
• Last Thursday: the insanity, the wonder, the stands. Petunia's Pastries has some gourmet vegan treats at their stand - I was in love with the Chocolate Hazelnut cupcake. There are usually at least 95 stands selling hand crafted vegan truffles, as well.
• Tofu Po Boys at Palm State Gumbo
• Michelle! my Alberta vegan guide.
• Alberta Coop at 15th.
• Mash Tun for tempeh hot wings
• Tin Shed for breakfast

So just walk the street up and down repeatedly, and pick your vegan indulgence!

What am I forgetting?

I'm going to consolidate these tips on my new location soon!

Super Quick Product Review: Rice Dream Supreme

Hey, Vanilla.

Hey, Hazelnut.

Hey, Fudge.

Sup?

Just for the fun of it, I wanted to give some love to this Rice Dream Supreme Vanilla Hazelnut Fudge bar I nearly swooned over last weekend.

It was really good! It's coated in dark chocolate, the ice cream is comfortably vanilla with a tint of my favorite nut and is remarkably creamy for a rice based ice cream.

Yeah, yeah, I know this is mostly the girl who tried mint chocolate Rice Dream seven years ago and quickly abandoned that icy pint, talking, and nondairy desserts have consistently improved and impressed over the years. I have friends that seem to swear by Good Karma's Carrot Cake. I thought it was alright, sorry!

The best part of the satisfying bar, though?

It was fifty freaking cents from the Hollywood Grocery Outlet.

It was the highlight of that quirky grocery outing.

Coming Soon:

Another new vegan cart in Portland: Ruby Dragon PDX at the North Mississippi Marketplace

Portland's VegFest

The Exquisite Vegan Dinner at Belly Timber

Vegan Eats in Spokane, WA

...and my site is moving!

Go Vegan for the Cookies!

Roasted Almond Chocolate Chip Cookies

(half sprinkled with coarse sea salt)

Lots of Try Vegan Week tabling and Vegan Prom ticket selling took place over the weekend. And at every event I was at, I made sure there were free vegan baked goods.

Sharing scrumptious vegan cookies = just the type of vegan I am.

Altogether, I baked three batches of Isa's new chocolate chip cookie variations, two pans of raspberry chocolate chips blondies, oatmeal espresso butterscotch cookies, citrus coconut glitters and raspberry swirl East Coast coffeecake. Many of those are from Terry and Isa's upcoming Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. Wink, wink.

I found a little bit of extra time to chop veggies for kabobs and a giant pan of lower fat new farm mac & cheeze for the opening day Vegan BBQ. The turn out was fantastic!

At the Hawthorne Street Fair

My friend Chelsea tabled all day - she's the author of Flavor Vegan and giving a talk on Vegan Baking tonight at Hungry Tiger Too at 8pm I'm planning on checking out. She knows her flours and egg replacers intimately!

I also sold tickets for vegan prom at the 12th and Hawthorne food carts late night outside of Whiffies deep fried pies (including vegan double chocolate, chocolate creme and savory tofu pot pie), and will be doing so THIS Friday night.

That's also the night of the Vegan Pub Crawl starting at Report Lounge on E Burnside and 11th (same location as prom!!) at 9pm. Maeve and I will be breaking off and heading to the carts for 11pm to sell!

Come visit, eat vegan cookies & buy your ticket - it's the following night!

Purposely underbaked by request (whoa-oh)

espresso oatmeal roasted almond chocolate chip

Oh hey, I bought more vegetables this weekend. Hollywood Farmers Market.

Nice to stop by there! Heirloom tomatoes omg omg omg omg.

One more time! Try Vegan Week is now happening! Check out the schedule here.

Yeah, the U CAN'T TOUCH THIS! Vegan Prom is this weekend!

90s style dance off. 90s music. AWESOME prizes.

vegan food. vegan DJs.

90s pop culture icon named specialty drinks (booze and no-booze)!

There's absolutely a drink called The Carlton.

come with a date, come with friends, come solo!

dress up, dress down, dress grunge, dress to dance!

Dandies Marshmallows + Brownies + Butterscotch Chips =

a birthday greeting for my friend Joanna, the super fly author of Yellow Rose Recipes. It's also the first culmination of my WHAT TO DO WITH A BAG OF DANDIES? post from last week.

Joanna and I met with friends from the PPK at the Bye & Bye last night (omg! Celine, Joni, Kim and Alin are in town!) for cocktails, Floor Punches, grub and conversation - and as Maeve and I were leaving for a Yelp Elite event, in walks Julie Hasson and her husband Jay with two pies!

Julie pretended to force me to take a bite of the banana creme, I did, I could rave about that wonderful dessert for an hour and a half, and what was my original point?

Happy Birthday Joanna!!!!

Smorey Butterscotch Brownies

They are admittedly thin because I used a slightly larger sized pan than the recipe called for. The original recipe is for Espresso Brownies that will be in next year's Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar by Isa Chandra Moskowtiz and Terry Hope Romero.

I added vegan butterscotch chips (from Pandacookie!!), a few halved Dandies vegan marshmallows before baking, and a bunch on top during the last few minutes of oven time. It fluffed up! Then it fluffed down. And then they were nibbled. There was still some of the desired gooeyness on top - yeah, Dandies rule.

Here's the BBQ platter Maeve and I shared at the Bye & Bye, my favorite dish on the menu. It's $1 off during happy hour. FYI, they've gladly swapped the collards for brussels before, if you're into that sort of thing!

Coffee Plant hug. The quickest post ever.

Faint with me now,

Soy Latte and freshly baked cinnamon roll 

from Coffee Plant, downtown Portland.

What type of week was this??

As usual, I have posts in the works for this site and Stumptown Vegans,(NYC Vegan Ice Cream show down! Perierra Creperie!) but I'm a little busy at work, which means quite busy in real life.  I'm headed to Spokane for the rest of the week for work, so if you have some recommendations there on what to do and where to dine, please don't keep them locked up. Please share.

Portlanders - VeganTwitNic this weekend! Sunday, June 21st, 1pm at Colonel Summers Park.

The Final Spring 2009 NYC Post: #3 - Ice Cream Shoppe Love.

My sister Jenny is serious about vegan ice cream.

Not only did she enjoy the Coconut Vanilla flavor at Stogo so much she ordered it twice, she almost cracked a real smile.

I had ice cream twice from NYC vegan ice cream shoppe Stogo and once from Lula's while on my vacation last month. At Stogo's, one day was cold, while the other day was sweltering, meaning the end of the world, of course. Both visits included fabulous friends from the PPK forums. Right off the bat, don't ask me to pick a favorite between the two shoppes!

Alright, I will - Lula's was cuter and more old fashioned, and sweetly vegan owned, but I liked the actual ice cream at the yuppie-gelato shop style Stogo more when it comes down to it. Whatever, go to both! Definitely go to Lula's, I still really liked my ice cream and experience there, as you'll see more below. It's adorable!

Witness the Panda and Bazu eat ice cream.

The Stogo selection - of course we tasted a few, like the salted pecan caramel - whoa.

I like how it's all fancy gelato style.

Coffee ice cream.  This! hot day! This! This!

My favorite from Stogo, and from all 3 ice cream stops (again - 2 at Stogo, 1 at Lula's)  Visit #2 was with Amanda and Gory. 

My coffee, Mike's Chocolate Brownie or Chocolate Coconut, I forget which.

Oatmeal Raisin Cookie -

how could I not? This was my first flavor, and it was good! and creamy!,

but a teeny weeny leeny yeeny bit lacking in flavor and sweetness.

Really!

  This thread is actually backyards - the first place we went to was Lula's!

The Panda with her ice cream cone!

I almost went for the cake batter soft serve, but the sample I tried was a bit on thin side, though the flavor was everything the 5 year old inside me wanted.

I opted for the classic Chocolate Peanut Butter- 

anytime a combination of these two is more peanut butter than chocolate, I'm down.

Behind the scenes of Where's the Revolution?

Lula's full name is Lula's Sweet Apothecary. Not just vegan ice cream, but vegan sweets as well, like these chocolate covered pretzels, and truffles in the background.  Evan of Bjorked Off! has a love song of a post here you should check out!

The Lula's case.

Oh hey, how about my routine obligatory trip to Long Island?  

I was there for less than 6 hours, saw my grandfather, my great Aunt Helen, my friend Alyse again, and had a bizarre meal at the 'upscale' coffeehouse turned fancy restaurant Milk & Sugar in Bay Shore.

This latte hurt my head.  Raspberry, with a freaking piece of rock candy.

We sat down, ordered our coffee, and were then presented with this bread and a dinner menu.  Ignore the butter, obviously.

My sister asked if the housemade 'Milk' veggie burger was vegan, and it actually was, so I went for it. It's not very often one gets the chance to order a housemade vegan burger in the city they were born in! Alyse had one as well, though Jenny opted for the real thing. The sealed tiny bottle of ketchup on every plate pissed me off so much.

One more family shot for the road - my brother, Rick, at Milon.

celeb sightings.

I'm sorry that I lack the skills or determination to zoom in on this photo, but on our way from Lula's to Stogo, Bazu and I nearly shit our pants with smiles when we passed Alan Cumming walking one dog and holding another on the street. That's him in the orange. And on my first day in NYC, I walked by Jorma Taccone of Lonely Planet at the Union Square farmers market. Wondering who that is?  He starts with Andy Samberg in the Jizz in My Pants video, duh.

The end!  

For more:

NYC 2009 Food Porn #1, featuring Veg Dim Sum House

NYC 2009 Food Porn #2, featuring Soy & Sake

And follow Get Sconed! on twitter, if you dare.

Next: The great Vegan Brunch post, where I'll feature everything I made as a recipe tester!