Here’s some photos of my latest collaborative food event, this time working with Shan Raoufi, bohemian hottie and founder of $20 Toothpick.

The concept is simple: much like the way Bruce Wayne’s basement is the Batcave, Shan transforms his humble Brooklyn apartment into a restaurant. I think his bed morphed into a dinner table for 6, but I can’t say for sure because my back was turned.
Guests port their own potables,
We serve a four course vegan feast.
There’s no charge for the food but the (mandatory) toothpick brought out at the end costs $20.
Catchy, no?

Shan and I had a drag-out fight about first course. He was set on having beets star in the taquitos filling; I thought he was crazy. We arm-wrestled for Top Chef and I humbly report that these taquitos were beautiful, hell-yeah tasty, and probably the most popular course. It’s the beets.

The Chilled Spicy Melon Soup (recipe here) was the second course. Very colorful and cold, it was a good choice for steamy evening.
To be fair, some folks aren’t that fond savory fruit dishes or even cold soups for that matter, but for more adventurous types it’s a hit.

The main course was inspired by the cookbook The Artful Vegan. Huitlachoche is known as “Mexican Corn Truffle” to some, “Corn Smut” to others. In any case, it’s a mushroomy delicacy that flavors this tamale-like dish. Shan and I agreed that the combination of the rich mole sauce, the kicky carrot sauce, and the risqué sounding corn whatever-it-is made this dish just sexy enough to star as the main course.

I heard afterward from some non-vegan guests how surprised they were about the “meatiness” and heartiness of this dish, attesting that Shan and I accomplished what we set out to do: serve a fantastic, life-affirming meal that just so happened to be vegan.

My favorite discovery this past week is this amazing vegan spice cookie recipe from Kaji’s Mom. I’m not much of a baker, but she sure is! The cookies are soft, fat, and spicy (I probably doubled the cinnamon and ginger.)
We sandwiched some store-bought soy ice cream in between the cookies and French-served a pour of a hot strawberry-rhubarb-acai sauce over the top. Mmmmm!

Thanks to everyone who attended, and for all those on our waiting list (we were overbooked) for next time. I promise there will be one.

Also thanks to my (now official?) photographer Andrew Strasser and my delightful Brooklyn-virgin colleague Poundcake for taking all the pics you see on this post.

more photos on my Flickr page

If you live in or around NYC and would like to be on my mailing list for upcoming veg’n events, please send me an email at vanesscipes@gmail.com

Photos from past Saturday’s brunch, sans any commentary.

All these pics (and more) were taken by the esteemed Andrew Strasser.  Many thanks Andrew!

 

  

 

         

Thanks to the forty-five+ Brunchers who braved the cold last Saturday to participate in my first commercial food endeavor and first multimedia collaboration with the folks at LondonParisNewYork. Hurrah! Three Cheers! Hope you had a great time - I certainly did. Please post or send me your comments and criticisms of the event. I’d love to hear feedback and ideas on what sort of thing you’d like to see in the future. i.e: more samurai centerpieces, more sitar, or more salads?

I’ll be posting food photos and recipes for the Spinach & Grapefruit Salad as well as the best darn Vegan Biscuits and Gravy soon but email me if you’re looking for the recipe for the Breakx-Mex Casserole… it’s a special favorite of mine and I’m not quite ready to go public with the recipe yet.

Thanks to the ladies and dudes at LondonParisNewYork for making the space-, land- and sound- scapes so amazing. Also, a hearty “couldn’t have done it without you” to the sisters who always impress me with their can-do attitude and ability to just plain get it done.
The Lil Sis endured a hangover and The Sistaster made the pastries:

A guest enjoys a vegan treat

And of course a special thanks to Z for turning 27 with progressively more style than when he turned 24, 25 and 26. Can’t wait to 28.

Happy Saturday!

First of all, a big thank you to everyone who made it out the Synesthete’s Bunch earlier today. I loved cooking for ya’ll and hope you enjoyed the show, the ambiance and the food. For those of you who missed it, it was hard to describe - sort of like dining in one of those cheesy/luxe jewelry boxes with a spinning ballerina, but the ballerina was a handsome young man with a strawberry oil-cloth apron and the music was tinkles and wails and sitars and the walls looked like an Applebee’s art collection curated by Dr. Seuss. We’ll do it again soon, but right now I’m very very tired.

Stay tuned for photos and recipes later this week.

The following photos are a week late, seven bucks short, and have very little to do with vegetarian recipes. Here’s my half-hearted tie-in: I dressed as the “Veggieburgler” to promote vegetarianism at the Idiotarod.
One conversation I had went something like this:

Guy Dressed in Green: Hey, you’re the Hamburgler!
Me: (Showing him the detail on my tie that said “Soy Power”) Well, actually, I’m the Veggieburgler.
Guy: Oh. (pause) I’m a snake!

A cold Fry Guy and the Veggieburgler

People were pretty tickled to see someone wearing a giant hamburger on their head and though we didn’t win we got a shout out from the judges here, though they incorrectly identifed us from being from DC (only Ronald, Grimace, and the cart are DC based.)

Enjoy.

More Flickr Idiotarod 2007 Hoopla here.

This is my local Williamsburg pizza slinger!

I’m psyched, yet somewhat dismayed that the cat’s let out of the bag, that the Times just featured Jesus, a Brooklyn personality truly of Soup Nazi proportions. His bag-popping is a spectator sport, and his cool, calm, headmistress-like control of a rowdy 3am hipster crowd is truly a feat of nature. It’s his line, damn it, and until he says “Nnnnnext please!” and you order nicely, no slice for you!

The Sistaster made the mistake, over 2 years ago mind you, of once storming out because she mistakenly thought she was overcharged for a “White Slice” (upgrade white cheese, no sauce.) Since then, the sisters and I have become objects of ridicule in this establishment and are under constant threat of being overcharged and served a white slice instead of a regular slice. Albeit in the most charming way.

This one’s for you, Jesus. Charge us all you want. We’ll keep coming back.

p.s. the pizza is good too!