Vegan Wedding Cake, Cupcakes and Dip

Dear Bloggers - readers & writers,

Kevin and I have just returned from our most wonderful wedding and fantastic Canada-travels. I am an honest woman now (hah) and loved the intimate and quiet nature of our ceremony. Despite (or maybe because of) being gigantically pregnant, I had a great time with Kevin, celebrating with our family and close friends.


Sadly, we missed having Kevin's parents, our bestest bud Kim and other work mates around us while we celebrated, but those who were present filled us the spaces of our celebration with great laughs, awesome memories and total kindness.

Food, food, on to food. We went to a Mediterranean restaurant after the ceremony - La Luna in Hamilton of course. The food was great. But nothing bet the decadent vegan chocolate cakes that we had to top off the night. I love/hate Whole Foods so much sometimes. They did manage to pull through for me on this one, but I still have niggly feelings about their practices. (Damn seduction by chocolate).


My sister made the BEST vegan cupcakes I have ever had! She has been experimenting with baking in ways that are better explained as explorations of studio-quality food. Vegan cupcakes did not deter her during my trip home and she made both the chocolate and vanilla cupcakes from VCTOTW (which we bought her during the trip).

They were fantastic! Emily is a star!


My mom also made some kickin' dips - a cilantro infused guacamole and a dynamite tomato dip. The day after the wedding I spent lunch time with my face in the pita and dip.

The last foodie bit to share is from our trip to Montreal. We spent two nights in this great city. Both for honeymooning and also for the intention of seeking out options for our next move. Loved every minute, but our travels around The Plateau was dreamy and we found the best veg thai restaurant! Totally impressive food at ChuChai on St. Denis street. Check them out!


I can't wait to catch up on everyone's blogs! Missed you guys.
Have a great week!

Lots of love,
Ms. VeganCowGirl

Here Comes The ...... Cupcake

We just got back from the wedding reception, and everything had such good reviews and the photos turned out so well that I couldn't wait to share.

I made four recipes today, and they all turned out to my satisfaction (though, to be honest, I didn't taste the cupcakes - but I did go on the compliments of many Early Childhood Ed teachers, and those people KNOW their cupcakes).

However, it wasn't the cupcakes or the salad I made that really made me feel like I had accomplished something special, it was the Marble Berry Cheesecake that I really and truly made to celebrate an exciting day for K and I. And after downing a slice of it (and maybe a little extra) I am really excited to share this easy, but totally delectable, recipe with everyone.

Marble Berry Cheesecake

Ingredients (Base) 1 cup of walnuts, 10 soaked dates (I am sure they don't HAVE to be soaked).

I just whipped these through the historical food processor and pressed into my spring form pan.

Ingredients (Cakiegoodness) 2 cups of cashews, 1 cup of soy milk, 1/2 cups of soy cream cheese, 3 tbsp of agave, 1 cups of blueberries, 1 cup of black berries, 3 tbsp of arrowroot and 1 tbsp of cornstarch.

I whirled the cashews and soy milk into a nice cream before adding the cream cheese, and agave. On the advice I took from Raw Freedom (though this cake was hardly raw) I took out half of the cream at this point and then added the berries to the remaining cream. I pulsed and was ready to start pouring the thick cream onto my base. I did this by adding the white, unberried cream first, with the pretty purple cream going on top. I took my knife and ran it through to make the pretty marble design.

I put it in the freezer to set, and then added blueberries and lavender sugar to the top. Tahhh Dahhhh. So yummmy.



I also made a tabbouleh salad using these gorgeous organic heritage tomatoes, which I found at the market on Wednesday.

And now...the cupcakes.

I made two batches. The first was a chocolate and orange cake topped with a chocolate ganache (my first ever), and orange rind. The second was vanilla and sesame cake with a coconut and cream cheese icing. They were enjoyed by grownups and kids alike....but, they didn't come without a little tragedy in my kitchen...a little fire while whisking the ganache??? and a small electocution and a broken wine glass. Such is cooking with Lyndsay Kirkham!

Figs and Wedding Fun

I want to back up a bit.

About three weeks ago, to a dinner that followed a trip to our Wednesday market, where we procured an interesting veg I had never tried - Wild Asparagus. These thin little grass-like greens can be blanched to perfection in about 1 minute's time. We made a pretty yummy meal - one which was more clandestine than considered.

So here it is:

I started out with some green onions and a little bit of oil in a medium sized/medium warm pan and added some fresh figs, which I had cut into coins. I let this caramelize, adding some really yummy looking fresh mushrooms and spinach towards the end. I also added some lemon-thyme and some sage from our little terrace garden. I let these cook down a little while longer, while I went to town prepping the fu...when I say prepping I mean pressing and slicing almost in half (more like an incision, which left the thick steaks with a book-like appearance). I stuffed the fig/onion/spinach mixture inside the steaks and popped them in the oven to bake at about 375 for 40 minutes.

I reserved some of the fig sauce for the top, which I added with about 10 minutes left in the bake time. Yummmy.

The asparagus was thrown in a pot of boiling water for one minute and served as a side.

Wedding plans are tripping along wonderfully - we just sent out our Save The Date Cards...is that pretentious? I don't think so....we work with so many folks that travel, and we don't want any one taking off before they get to join us for the vegan wedding of the century. Plus, with folks coming from Canada and the U.K. we want to be able to give people the chance to get in on early flights etc. It was so nice to get so many kind responses from our co-workers.....congrats and such.

We made the cards ourselves and were really happy with the end results. We think we might do the same for the actual invites....and replies...and thank yous. Saved paper, saved shipping and saved me from the consumer wedding dragon, which, I am trying to avoid at all costs.

One can leave a giant not-so-eco footprint with weddings...jesus. We have tried to be aware of that by securing vegan options where ever possible, and staying as eco as we can. There are some great websites out there, many of them from the U.K., such as Eco Wedding and PortoVert, which I quite prefer. We did manage to book Tan for our wedding supper and have booked a vegan caterer for the buffet dinner that we will have later that night at the chateau. The land that we are having the reception on is as eco as possible for Brussels, and I hope to find an earth friendly way to buy the dress of my dreams. Things are coming along with no hitches so far...which makes me worry that all the hiccups will happen on April 11th 2009.

Oh, one last bit of news. It looks like this vegan cowgirl will be whipping up her creations in the most fantastic kitchen she has ever laid eyes on. We got the apartment we wanted so badly....2 bed, backyard, right next to a huge park, still in biking distance to work and the whole kitchen is kitted out in WOOD....it is gorgeous. The best part: the hallway is fitted with its own bookshelves. How amazing is that, this little nerd can NOT wait to get in there.