Mothers Day Feast: A Feast for Mothers
Mothers Day in particular is special for me, because I have the best mother in the world. Seriously, I know a lot of people say that, but it’s true in my case. (Actually, scratch that…I don’t know a lot of people who say that.) To celebrate my mother and the other mothers at our motherloving party, I cooked an epic vegan feast. One of my favorite things about family gatherings is that I can introduce free and delicious vegan food to my very suspicious relatives. There’s nothing more rewarding to a vegan cook than to have a staunchly carnivorous grandfather not only eat your food, but enjoy it.
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How NOT to Make an Ice Cream Cake
However, don’t do what I did. Follow the instructions of someone who knows what they are doing.
Or…
If you don’t like being told how to do something, and you prefer being AWESOME, read on.
My birthday this year was quite uneventful, so I decided that my birthday cake would be special: Ice cream cake! I’ve never made one before, and haven’t had one since elementary school, when other kids had those Carvel cakes at their parties. So now it was my time. (THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN MY TIIIIME!) However, I didn’t think the process through enough. So, this post is more of a ‘What Not to Do’ version of ‘How to Make an Ice Cream Cake’. Some truly amazing cake wreck pictures wait ahead.
What’s hard to tell, though, is that the frosting melted into the top, coloring the cake, and then all of it slid off into those soupy corners, mixing with the ice cream to make admittedly delicious, viscous plasma. The top looks iced, but it’s mostly just the cocoa that seeped into the pores.
It doesn’t look too bad when it’s sliced, does it? But it was, oh it was. Have faith.
BEST EVER VANILLA CAKE
Adapted from Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s Vanilla Bean cupcakes
- 2C unsweetened non-dairy milk (vanilla almond is my choice)
- 3t apple cider vinegar
- 2½ C all-purpose flour
- 2t baking powder
- 1t baking soda
- 1t salt
- 2/3C canola oil
- 1¼ C sugar
- 2t vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350°. Pour the milk and apple cider vinegar into a measuring cup; let it stand for at least five minutes until it curdles. I usually leave it for longer to ensure quality curdling action. Mix the dry ingredients (minus the sugar) in a mixing bowl. Add the sugar, then the oil, vanilla, and curdly milk and mix until just combined; do not overmix. Pour into two 8x8inch baking pans, or two round ones, or do what I did and do one square pan and one circular. (You should also wear 2 different shoes.) Bake for 45 minutes.
LET THE CAKES COOL. Like, for hours, not for 15 minutes like I did. Holy crap, I’m serious.
ONCE YOUR CAKES ARE COOL.
Take out your ice cream of choice. I used Trader Joe’s Cherry Chocolate Chip soy ice cream. It’s gooood. It reminds me of my childhood favorite, Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia, but it’s better because it’s doesn’t hurt animals OR your stomach! By the by, is there a website yet that has veganized the Ben & Jerry’s flavors? Because I’d buy an ice cream maker for that purpose. K maybe I’ll do it. I’m on it!
Getting back to the task at hand…
Let your ice cream thaw for a good 30 minutes. If it’s really super crazy hot in your kitchen, you’ll probably only want to leave it out for 15-20. We don’t want milk here. Also, I’m sorry you’re so hot!
I mixed a bag of Trader Joe’s confectioner’s sugar (a pound) with 1/4C cocoa powder and 1/3C Earth Balance, plus splashes of almond milk. And then, as you can see at right, I mixed it with a hand blender.
Tip: Put the bowl in the sink, because this will shoot powder, both the sugar and cocoa variety, all over the place.
*If you were a goody two shoes and you assembled it properly, you still need to put the whole thing in the freezer. You just don’t have to scream while doing it.
Eating in Madrid, Spain: All-Vegan Bar Food at B13
I was also lured to B13 because it actually has vegan Spanish omelette, the staple dish of potato-filled omelette. It’s so good and I really really wanted a vegan version. Guess what. None that day. They also were out of the croquettes, which sounded great. Arghaaanauts.
The other combo platter we made was the breaded seitan steak with salad and onion rings. Hrm. This seitan steak was…weird. It was super soft ‘seitan’, like you could tell it was maybe made with flour and not vital wheat gluten and not made correctly, and it was suuuuper sweet. It actually tasted like a maple syrup-covered pancake. But it was seitan. Husband couldn’t eat it. I tried. I did not fully succeed.
This is the point where our story gets very very sad. One of the best parts about B13 is that they have soy milkshakes! And milkshakes are one of the best foods out there! The availability of milkshakes was my #1 reason for wanting to go to B13. You’ve probably already guessed what happened: no milkshakes that day. Sadface.
They did have one last piece of cream cake. Or pie. I am not really sure what this was, but it had a wide layer of light thick sweet cream that was just really really good. The wondrous fluffy cream came on top of a spongy vanilla cake layer, and it was all topped with delicious caramel-ly crushed nuts. So yay for that.
Water speed: Hooray for a carafe, though refills were slow.
Service: Staff is mostly behind the bar, which we were near, so we could talk to them easily.
Bathrooms: One or two very typical bar bathrooms.
Food: Disappointing if you want great food (or anything you were jonesing for on the menu), but good if you just need somewhere vegan.
Bonus: An all-vegan place in the middle of any city is pretty cool!