Harajuku! Harajuku!

I wasn't kidding when I recently described Harajuku as my spiritual home. I adore everything about spending hours wandering the crowded streets whether I'm shopping with money burning a hole in my pocket or with no cash at all. It's always a joy. Having grown up inspired by the fashions coming out of this area of Tokyo getting to take part in the Harajuku Fashion Walk last weekend felt like a conclusion of a dream! I felt nervous going along to the meeting point, I thought that perhaps my style isn't quite out-there enough for the walk these days. A very white Air B&B bathroom means that my hair is still blonde not mauve and most of my clothes are in storage! Still, I headed to the meeting point and bumped into an Instagram friend and some of her friends who were also visiting Tokyo and we quickly bonded over group photo awkwardness and our shared love of everything Japanese.

I didn't take a single picture during the walk as I was being swept along in the fun of it all but Nick snapped this one in front of MoshiMoshi Box, you can see Harajuku Fashion Walk organiser Junnyan in the foreground! As soon as the walk and subsequent photoshoot were over we hightailed it back to Takeshita Street to get our Purikura on. I love these ridiculous booths and it turns out that six people really is the upper limit if you want all of your faces in the frame! 

Punk Rock Holiday, Slovenia

The first thing I looked into when planning this summer's European adventure was whether there were any punk festivals happening that I just had to attend. Punk Rock Holiday was in the right place at the right time and with the right lineup and everything fell nicely into place. One of my BFF's was even able to fly into Slovenia from the UK to hang out for a week which was brilliant and not just because she came bearing mix CD's and bourbon biccies although that was a definite bonus. The van did us proud surviving without an electricity or water hook up for the whole week and providing us with perfectly chilled drinks and morning soya yoghurts the whole time. We had a blast hanging out but our week at Punk Rock Holiday didn't come without issues and challenges.

Living in the real world can be a challenge once you've had your eyes opened to all forms of oppression and it's impossible not to look at the world through a critical lens. As someone who identifies as an intersectional feminist and who is aware of (and further educating themselves on) critical theories surrounding race and gender I feel like my lens is wide open. In a lot of cases it would definitely be conducive to my enjoyment of situations to be able to switch that awareness off but honestly, I've tried and it's impossible.

I've been into punk music since I was 16, so over half of my life, and if you've met me or read this blog for a while this'll come as no surprise. For me punk isn't just about the music but the politics behind it. Not every band I like is political, Less Than Jake are all about the dancing, but as I grow older I like the music I listen to to have more substance. I've been attending gigs and festivals to get my fix of live music since I was 17 and have attended V Fest, Reading, Glastonbury, Ozzfest, Groezrock, Slam Dunk, Boomtown and, most recently, Punk Rock Holiday.

Punk Rock Holiday (henceforth referred to at PRH) has been running for four years now and I'd heard a little about in the last couple of years as people I know via social media have attended. PRH has by far the most beautiful setting of any festival I've attended being as it's situated in the Slovenian mountains next to a fast flowing (but utterly freezing) river. The stages are shaded either by trees or by canopies the festival organisers have thoughtfully constructed and, as I veteran festival attendee, I was excited to discover that there were no timetable clashes at all! The smaller beach stage ran from midday until around 6pm and then the main stage hosted bands between 6:30 and 2am. I was able to check out all of the bands on my must see list - Against Me!, Anti Flag, Madball, Teenage Bottlerocket, War On Women and Less Than Jake, as well as spending plenty of time discovering awesome new-to-me bands like Not On Tour, Siberian Meat Grinder, Ratos De Porao and The Decline to name a few.

Wood chips also mysteriously appeared overnight to cover any dangerously slippery patches of mud and they somehow had better wifi serving the camper van area and the main stage than the majority of the campsites I've stayed at this summer have had in their reception areas. This was super awesome because when it costs £1 to make a call to your friend's phone having the ability to fire off an iMessage is important. PRH also had a more environmentally aware crowd than at any other festival I've attended - I think the beautiful location contributes to that as does the €1 cup deposit you pay for any alcoholic beverage but it's also the only place I've ever seen people putting out their (totally gross but that's a whole 'nother thing) cigarettes and depositing the butts into the nearest bin.

From a vegan and sober ally perspective this festival won over all of the others I've been to, yes almost every single one of the other 5000 people there were drunk the majority of the time but people were better behaved in their drunkeness than at any other festival I've been to - nobody set fire to any tents or gas canisters, nobody tipped over any portaloos or tried to destroy the lighting rig and yes, depressingly, this did come as a surprise!

PRH is also incredibly vegan friendly and there were good drink options for the sober walking among us. Every single stall at the beach stage was 100% vegan and the food was both varied and of excellent quality. I was able to get my fix of tofu burgers, juices, kebabs, hummus and roasted vegetable sandwiches and raw vegan ice creams whenever I fancied.

There were also salads, seitan kebabs and raw cakes and you were allowed to take your own water bottle into the arenas where the bands were playing. That's something that's been a no-no at other fest's I've attended and it's one of the more rage inducing things to have your reusable water bottle confiscated by security to then have to spend the day purchasing plastic bottles of water that are more expensive than beer - I'm looking at you Groezrock.

Despite these great things I ended up feeling deflated, irritated and angry on so many occasions during the week because of the rampant sexism I saw coming from both festival attendees and the bands themselves. As a woman who has been involved in the punk scene for a long time it wasn't entirely surprising but as I've recently been moving in more inclusive and socially aware circles it definitely brought me back to the real world with a bump, no, a crash. I was left with a feeling that despite PRH being pretty left of mainstream when it came to the lineup, environmental awareness and prevalence of vegan options that it was ultimately pretty damned mainstream when it came to it's politics. Sure, I saw plenty of anti fascist and anti racist flags, t-shirts and pin badges which was great but where were the people challenging the sexism (and, to a lesser extent, ablism) coming from both the bands and their fans? I ended up giving up noting down instances of sexism because it was just too exhausting (and my phone battery kept dying) but here are just a few examples:

• I was wolf whistled at five times whilst bending to apply suncream to my legs at 9:30 in the morning.
• Whilst walking with a female friend a man had a quick discussion with another man about whether we were hot or not before waving a "Spank Bank" sign in our direction.
• Whilst War On Women (one of the handful of bands featuring female artists) were playing a man shouted "thanks for the nipples" at the lead singer.
• A man kissed my female friend on the cheek whilst she was sleeping outside her tent.
• One band asked if everyone was enjoying the beach and pointed out that they all were because of all of the "hot chicks" he further went on to explain that he's had "enormous balls" all day because of the way the women there looked.
• A man onstage used the term retarded to describe the way a fellow bandmate was acting
• I spotted one man walking around wearing a "Boob Inspector" lanyard.
• When the drummer and bassist of one band messed up a song the lead singer called them "girls" in a derogatory tone.

Even writing that felt tiring and experiencing it was even more so. One moment I'd be enjoying a pop punky tune, dancing in the sun with my friends and the next I was being reminded about how much sexism, ablism and objectification there is in the world and that despite being surrounded by "punks" nobody else even seemed to notice. These microaggressions added up and conspired to give me a less than perfect view of what could have been a close-to-idea festival.

The white male led punk scene has a lot of work to do if it wants to be more inclusive of women and people of colour and that has to start at the top with the people putting on shows and festivals like PRH. If no consideration is made at that level to include more bands featuring women (including women of colour) the scene itself will remain unchallenged and unchanged. Five bands featuring women on a 56 band lineup is a pitiful and inadequate attempt at inclusivity and I would hope that nobody would suggest that it's because there aren't great bands with female vocalists, guitarists, bassists and drummers out there because there are and they aren't hard to find.

I have since read more about the festival Fluff Fest which takes place every July in the Czech Republic and has an anti sexism and sexual violence policy in place - I haven't been (yet!) but I would assume that such a policy stretches to the things bands say on stage as well as the behaviour of attendees. This must foster a safer space and therefor attract a more radical crowd who are more empowered to challenge sexism when it does happen. I would like to see Punk Rock Holiday adding such a policy so that it can be an enjoyable holiday for everyone attending.

Huge Ass Vida Vegan Con 2015 Recap

Oh Vida Vegan Con, what a whirlwind of wonderful you were. I literally could not have been more excited when the VVC crew announced that the con was moving from Portland to one of my favourite cities in the world, Austin, TX. Hell yeah! Any excuse to come back right?! The SE Asia - USA - Europe route around the world has to be one of the more ridiculous ones ever but it has been beyond worth it to be able to take part not only in VVC but also in the warm hug that is Austin's vegan community. I love it here and right now it feels more like home than, well, home. (Note: Jeeze, I knew that I wouldn't be able to write this post without crying!)

Unoficially Vida Vegan Con began on Thursday night with a meet and greet at Buzzmill Coffee. Sweet Ritual were in attendance, Golden Spike Railcart were cranking out tacos and egg rolls and the sun was shining - it was fun and kinda overwhelming and I enjoyed hanging out by the name tag station meeting (and greeting!) everyone as they arrived.

The official conference fun kicked off with the Vida Vegan Con Bazaar at the Marchesa Hall and Theatre which was the most perfect venue ever. Everything fitted in so perfectly; there was ample parking, space for not just one but four food trucks including Arlo's, The Vegan Nom and Cool Beans, a huge theatre for talks and demos and plenty of room for all of the fantastic vendors and all of that with space to breathe!

After diving into the exclusive attendee only Miyoko's Kitchen Cheese Hour (I think all events should start with an exclusive vegan cheese hour btw) I hopped behind the speaker table with crackers in one hand and cheese in the other to sell some copies of my zine, European Vegan. That didn't last for long though because there was just so much to do (and eat!) and staying rooted to one spot was impossible!

I attended the parenting panel with Sayward Rebhal of Bonzai Aphrodite, The Sexy Vegan aka Brian Patton, Monique Koch of Brown Vegan and moderator Joanna Vaught because despite having no intentions of becoming a parent I am endlessly fascinated by people and what great people these are. It was really interesting and I think I definitely learnt some useful stuff even as a non-parent, hearing about people's life experiences is always interesting! Also, Joanna is endlessly hilarious and awesome so of course she was brilliant. The next panel that even the lure of tacos couldn't keep me away from was the How We Made Austin Awesome panel starring the man behind some of my favourite tacos, Chris Rios, Kristen Davenport of Capital City Bakery, Rabbit Food Grocery's Jessica Morris, Molly Frisinger of Lone Star Plate / Texas Veg Fest Fame and moderator Stefanie Bogdanich aka Lazy Smurf.

They started out wonderfully with this ridiculously catchy song (that apparently now makes me quite emotional!) and it just continued to be awesome from there on in.

The next morning it was time for registration and swag bag collection and I was immediately drawn to this section of the coffee stand where some genius decided that mini-marshmallows are now an appropriate breakfast item. They were meant for topping off your coffee but as a non coffee drinker I just threw a handful of Dandies mallows into a mug and went on my way!

The swag bag is an important part of VVC and despite being part of team swag bag (we spent hours stuffing these things!) I was still excited to have one of my very own. So excited in fact that I only managed to snap this Instagram ready snapshot that I was then too excited to post! Ridiculous!

My excitement levels weren't set to drop anytime soon because what came next was breakfast and woah what a breakfast it was! There were two buffets to choose from, a breakfast taco buffet, it is Austin y'all, and an artisan toast buffet. I'd been eating my way through Austin's tacos for a couple of weeks by this point and the toast options looked too good to pass up so I dived right in. I had toast with cheese spread, toast with avocado and coconut bacon, toast topped with tofu scramble, toast with Chao on the side. Toast toast toast toast toast. I love toast!

After breakfast, and a quick break to pop the Swag Bag of Wonder in the car, it was time for some learnin' and I headed straight for Jackie Sobon from Vegan Yack Attack's class on Blogging Etiquette and Social Media Essentials where I learnt about how to expand the reach of my blog and the tools I can use to make that easier. It was a really helpful class and now I just need to find the time to read my notes and action all of the the things I learnt!

Vida Vegan Con's speaker line up this year was stellar and making decisions about where to go and what to see was hard. I felt like I had tough decisions to make for every class which is why I was overjoyed at the amount of people that chose to come to the Feminism and Veganism panel I was speaking on with Anika Lehde, Nicole J. Georges and our wonderful moderator Julia DeNoto.

As you can see feminists are humourless fun ruiners. NOT! We talked about the patriarchy, why Peta are awful and why calling your new food product skinny anything is a horrible idea. We discussed how food and food advertising are gendered and why that's uncool and of course we addressed the fact that we were an all cis white able-bodied panel and how we felt that a lot needs to change in the AR movement to welcome people of colour. We discussed intersectionality and Sistah Vegan and the Food Empowerment Project and why appropriating the #blacklivesmatter tag for your animal rights message is both appropriative and totally inappropriate. It was pretty damned wonderful to be up there with these amazing & inspirational lady people getting this anger making shit off of my chest! 

After the break I went to see Sayward Rebhal talking about Facing Failing Health as a Vegan and as someone who's had recent experience of this I was very interested in hearing what she had to say. It was great to hear someone else's story. After lunch I headed to Room 301 to hear The Vegan RD, Ginny Messina, talking about how to prevent ex-vegans by discussing strategies to help people maximise their success as vegans. I love her no-nonsense, science based attitude to veganism and health and I think that a lot of the blogging world could benefit from concentrating on the realistic benefits and ethics of veganism rather than throwing overblown health claims out there in the hope that they'll lure people towards veganism. 

I rounded out the day with Touring Your Book or Project with fellow veganism and feminism panelist Nicole J Georges and I found her advice both timely and invaluable. As well as inspiring everyone with her stories of taking her show on the road she also spoke about how it doesn't really matter whether you're feeling nervous about public speaking! She said that people don't really want to hear that, they've come to see you perform, in a way, and so telling everyone how nervous you feel doesn't fill your audience with confidence. They've chosen to spend their time seeing you speak so give it your all, whatever that takes. 

Given that my talk (that I was in fact feeling super nervous about) was the very next day this advice couldn't have been more timely. I took her advice and ran with it, every time I had a negative thought about whether I could do it I shut it down with a positive thought (this is something I've been doing when working on body positivity for years) and then I took her advice to get into the zone with your favourite tunes and went right out there as a more confident version of myself. Thanks Nicole! 

Sunday soon rolled around and after another epic breakfast the first talk of the day starred my friend and fellow blogger Randi with her hilarious and informative talk Stop Breaking the Law A$&h#* where we learnt about copyright law, libel and how to run competitions online legally and fairly. Top tip : most of you are doing it wrong and you should definitely read Erika's write up of the class here for a more in depth look at why.

My second stop of the day was the talk From Vegan Blogger to Internet Entrepreneur with Jill Pyle of Vegan Cuts / Vegan Backpacker fame. Now I don't see myself building a business anytime soon but I enjoyed hearing about her journey anyway, it's always fun to hear about other people who are following their dreams even when those dreams differ from yours. Before lunch I popped into Brian Patton's talk Tweet Like You Give a Damn which was funny because Brian's a pretty funny guy! I learnt that I'm mainly doing social media right (in Brian's opinion!) which was nice.

Lunch was soon upon us and it was taco buffet time! They had mac & cheese! Genius!

It turns out that Chef Brad whips up a mac & cheese that is tastier than the sum of it's parts and he was happy to share the recipe with the VVC crew. You can access it right here. Food aside another amazing thing about the shared meals and breaks at VVC is that you're surrounded by amazing people the whole time! People like Amey and Joanna. Love!

I managed to squeeze in my friend Josh's talk about apps and a little of Whitney Lauritsen's YouTube workshop before high tailing it outa there to prepare for my own talk, Adventures in Vegan Travel Blogging. 

Photo Credit Lazy Smurf

Erika from Sews Before Bros wrote a fantastic round up of the talk here so check that out if you're interested in my adventures and tips on travel blogging. Personally I thought the talk went fantastically and I've had some incredibly lovely feedback from some of the attendees. It was the first time I've ever felt comfortable speaking to a room full of people which proves that the fake it 'til ya make it approach will get you there in the end! 

The closing party at queer friendly downtown patio bar Cheer Up Charlie's was a whole lotta fun and it was great to relax and wind down with a cocktail and a whole lotta food after such a hectic weekend. Arlo's, the food truck with the best burgers in town, is parked outside Cheer Up Charlie's so of course I needed to eat one, Thai Fresh were also there with a delicious spread of desserts including ice creams and croissants. A basket of vegan croissants has to be one of the most beautiful things in the world right?

I was also super pleased to see Bistro Vonish making an appearance especially because they had mac & cheese kolaches! Kolaches! Filled with mac & cheese. It was like all of my dreams became a delicious reality! 

As if this evening couldn't get better the winners of the Red Hot Vegans Scavenger Hunt were announced and I won!! And my pal Amey came second! Hell yeah! We were both incredibly overexcited that our commitment to taking ridiculous photos all weekend and collaborating with each other and even going off together to take some of the more challenging pictures (two stepping to a live band anyone?!) had paid off. The excellent prizes (and maybe just a little smidgen of competitiveness) were what drove me to complete every single task thrown our way and I was ecstatic when Amey suggested the very thing that I was already thinking - splitting the prizes - so that we both took away $100 to spend at Rabbit Food Grocery and $50 to spend at Lugusta's Luscious. Yum!

I made a fun video of our Rabbit Food Grocery shopping spree which you can check out right here on my new You Tube channel.

Food and classes aside one of the most amazing things about Vida Vegan Con is the people, we make so many great connections online these days but it's often challenging to turn those online friendships into real life ones especially when those people, like Susan, live on the other side of the world!

I loved being surrounded by so many fun, inspiring and compassionate people and I can't wait to see you all again - I'll have you regretting inviting me to stay "whenever" pretty soon I'm sure! 

I'm not ashamed to admit that I've cried my eyes out on more than one occasion when I've been reminded that this was that last EVER Vida Vegan Con. It seems to me like VVC was flourishing and growing and becoming even more amazing and whilst I totally understand why Jess, Janessa and Michelle need a break from the sheer amount of work needed to put the conference together I can't help but feel that I (somewhat selfishly) wish it could go on. You really can't beat spending a weekend immersed in a supportive and enlivening vegan bubble surrounded by your friends from all over the world and I can't wait to see what pops up to replace it. Heck, maybe I'll come up with something, but for now I'm going to continue to immerse myself in my notes and let my brain process all of it's new knowledge!

MoFo '14 Day 3 - Taco or Beer Challenge

Well it's day three of Vegan MoFo and I'm breaking with my theme already - usually I make it at least 10 days before falling apart but this time it's for a good reason. I'm rabidly pro-choice and I love tacos so when my pal Stephanie, aka the Vegan Lazy Smurf, nominated me for the Taco or Beer Challenge it was a no brainier. Of course I'll do it! And what better place to do it than Austin, Tx the home of the best vegan breakfast tacos I've ever eaten. Honestly beer never even came into the equation - screw beer, tacos will always win in a fight over my heart.

If you haven't heard of the Taco or Beer Challenge I'll let Stephanie fill you in because whilst she is lazy in name I'm lazy in nature and I'm also on vacation (as they call it over here). She says...

"I think the whole idea might have started as a satire of the ice bucket challenge, you do something, tell everyone that you did it, and then donate to a cause. Why waste a bunch of water and pour ice on your head when you could instead eat a delicious taco or drink a refreshing beer (or both!) and then donate to fund abortion? It makes a lot more sense to me!"

It makes a lot more sense to me too Stephanie. Throwing around buckets of ice during a drought and donating to a charity that animal tests was never going to be a winning plan in my eyes but this? This I'm into! Cherrywood Coffeehouse is today's taco destination of choice.

At Cherrywood your taco comes with three fillings as standard (you can add more for $.50 or $1) and I went with the greatest combo, in my opinion anyway, of potatoes (yup, those are shoestring potatoes which are essentially breakfast chips - fuck yeah!), tofu (deep fried!! OMG!!) and avocado (because, fat and yum).

This was so ridic' delish' that I went back for a second immediately! As I ate two taco's I'm going to be donating to two abortion charities, first, as I'm in Austin I've donated to Whole Woman's Texas Action Fund because it sucks that awesome feminist abortion providers are having to shut down because of Republican political shit. Charity two is a little closer to home. The Abortion Support Network provide financial assistance and accommodation to people (regardless of gender identity) travelling from Ireland and Northern Ireland to England for a safe and legal abortion. 

Honestly it blows my mind that people think it's acceptable to tell people what to do with their own bodies and it both angers and saddens me that people are having to go through all of this to have an abortion in 20-fucking-14. I'm tagging my bff and fellow MoFo blogger Sal from Alien on Toast because I know she'll be up for the challenge! You don't need to be tagged to take the challenge on though, oh no, you can just go for it by eating a taco or drinking a beer, making a donation and tagging someone to start the chain off anew. 

Here's a bonus Cherrywood Coffeehouse patio dog. To channel Doge, so cute, very tail, much wow.

Happy MoFoing!

Food swap & a new falafel joint.

This weekend was pretty rad! Nick was around all weekend so we got to hang out loads, yay! We went shopping for fun ingredients for Vegan Eats World recipes on Saturday and whilst we were out we checked out the new falafel place on Sydney Street called We Heart Falafel.

We Heart Falafel make a vegan falafel wrap and a falafel salad bowl as well as some things with cheese in that we didn't pay attention to! The wrap and the bowl are vegan if you leave off the yoghurt sauce. I was a little disappointed when I realised that the only vegan sauce was chilli (allergies!), why no tahini sauce? But I was soon happy again after I tasted this delicious wrap.

It has hummus so it didn't really need another sauce and it was stuffed full of falafel and yummy salad which included crispy lettuce, beetroot, tomato & grated carrot. I loved this slightly toasted wrap & at £3.50 it's a total bargain. I'll definitely be eating it again soon.

On Saturday night we went to the Reclaim The Night march organised by Brighton Feminist Collective. It was such an amazing and inspiring evening. I was stewarding which meant that I helped keep people outa the way of oncoming traffic & I got to wear a fluorescent jacket! There's a video of the march and some of the speeches and poetry at the rally afterwards here.

On Sunday we dyed our hair, I've been bored of my blonde hair for a while now & I'm excited that it's pink & blue again!

My UK Vegan Food Swap package arrived just before the weekend and even if the box had been empty I think I'd have still been happy! Look...

I love Hello Kitty! How did they know?!! Normally I re-use boxes asap to send stuff but I might have to keep this one for storing things in! Unsurprisingly the stuff inside the box was great too.

The package included Love Hearts, banana chips, lots of healthy bars, Kettle Vegetable Chips, pea & hemp protein powders, a Cat & The Cream cupcake and an adorable card.

The cupcake didn't survive so well in the post and the cake part had dried out a little but the frosting was still absolutely delicious. I ate the Love Hearts at the Reclaim The Night rally, they were fun to pass out to friends new & old, and the vegi crisps lasted the time it took for me to drink a Hollows Ginger Beer. What a perfect combo! I've been a bit slack at sending my parcel out but I'm heading to the post office right after I publish this, I promise!

I also recently received a package of Trek bars from the people over at Natural Balance Foods. They sent me a whole box of my favourite flavour, Cocoa Brownie. Yum!

The people at Natural Balance Foods are also the people behind the Nákd bars I know & love. Small world! I still haven't tried the new Cafe Mocha flavour or the Cherry Infused Raisins, I'll have to try to pick some up when I head to the post office.

Last time I posted that my copy of Vegan Eats World had arrived, I've been steadily collecting ingredients and trying out new recipes and I'm loving it so far. My next post will be all about what I've made, see ya soon!

Fork Yeah It's Football Food Sunday!

Finally, the much anticipated (by my husband anyway!), Football Food Sunday is here. Woot Woot! This is the time of year where we get amped up about sport, I'm way more into it than I was last year, and embrace all things American. Now Football Food is kinda something I made up and to me it symbolises the kind of food you might get served at a stadium or sports bar, a really cool, really vegan-tastic stadium or sports bar!

This year, as an ode to Austin, we decided to start with tacos! We had actually never eaten a soft taco before our visit to Austin and our love affair with the Whole Foods breakfast taco. We'd tried hard shell tacos before and had a gotten it on with plenty of burritos but tacos are our favourite.

As you might've seen in this post we brought back some fun stuff from the USA including both Soy Curls and tortillas. I whipped out my copy of Vegan Diner and finally got to try a recipe I've been salivating over since I set eyes on it, the Smoky Curls.

The only things I had to buy for this were the fresh veggies, coriander and lime and, although I coulda made 'em myself, I also bought a tin of refried beans. It's Football Food Sunday, I think a little laziness is called for!

Alongside the Smoky Curls and refried beans we had guac, cilantro lime rice and tomatoes, well I had tomatoes, you couldn't pay Nick to eat a tomato! Everything came together really easily and I would only change a couple of things next time. Firstly, I'm going to buy myself a smaller cast iron pan. I wanted to be able to warm the tortillas in my cast iron so I had to cook the soy curls in my other pan but I think they woulda gotten crispier and more delicious in the cast iron. Secondly, I would add a little spice to my beans! I didn't realise until afterwards that these beans have no spice in them AT ALL! This brand of beans has always been A-ok with me in the past which thankfully means that my taste buds must finally be evolving. Next time I'll be adding a pinch of chilli powder and some extra garlic powder.

We absolutely loved our first attempt at tacos! The Smoky Curls were delicious, I'll definitely be making them again, and I'm looking forward to honing my taco making skills.

It's lounging on the couch watching football time now, earlier today I ran my first ever race & I'm feeling a little tired! Myself & three of my Brighton Feminist Collective buddies ran an 8k as a relay for local domestic violence charity Rise. Now I know that 2k isn't very far at all (apparently my brother laughed when my dad told him how far we were running - he ran a half marathon today!) but it was a big deal for me. I'm not what you'd call a natural runner and I was surprised to discover when training for this that I find running outside MUCH harder than running on a treadmill! 

 I'm number 60!

I'm super excited about running now, we managed to raise £395 for Rise (super close to our target!) and I hope that I'll be able to run the full 8k next year!

A fun weekend...

I spent Friday afternoon baking cupcakes for the Brighton Pro-Choice fundraiser at The Cowley Club.

I made Bourbon Biscuit & Raspberry Sweetie cupcakes. The Raspberry Sweetie cakes are topped with chopped Strawberry Pencils and pink sugar. I love how sparkly they are! Operation Icing has recently been baking for various local feminist events but I am still selling not-for-profit cupcakes through the website. This summer I'm going to start selling cakes in boxes of 6 rather than just 12, hopefully this'll make them more affordable for people as I know buying a batch of 12 cupcakes isn't something people can do very often.

This weekends Brighton Pro-Choice fundraiser was called Riot For Choice and we served food & showed films from 7-9, had spoken word performances & bands from 9-12 (Check out Caitlin's performance poetry on You Tube, she blows my mind with her awesomeness!) and then there was a DJ 'till 2am.

We made a meal of tapas which I was too busy serving to take a picture of! The kitchen crew made six dishes including Dal, Beetroot Soup, a rice & aubergine dish, Patatas Bravas, and a 'threesome' of roasted vegetables. Each plate cost £4 and came with free bread, you could choose from Paratha, Pitta, Rye Sunflower, Khobez or Chapati. Everyone seemed really into the food even though we ended up serving it a little late!

It was a super long but super fun day (how could an event with free candy floss be bad?!) which ended with my friends Nick, Caitlin & I washing up at 2am after the boiler had broken! Thankfully those guys are so awesome that it was somehow kinda fun & not a craptastic end to a great night!

I spend Saturday night with my BFF's Sal, Kip & Holley at Holley's house for her turn at fake Come Dine With Me! 

To start she made a wonderful Leek & Potato Soup with Homemade Bread.

This was delicious & even came with a fancy swirl of cream, very impressive Holley!

Her main course sounded incredibly fancy... 

...somehow Holley managed to make Smash (packet potato flakes), a Fry's chicken burger, gravy and spring greens sound, look and taste fancy! I don't know how she did it! Smash* is kinda a running joke between us and we were all amused and excited that someone finally served it!

*Smash has always been vegan but looking at their site it seems that they are in the process of changing the ingredients & adding milk. Check the ingredients of your Smash or buy Sainsburys own brand Potato Flakes to recreate this tasty meal at home in minutes!

Dessert was a huge chocolate brownie, vanilla Swedish Glace ice cream sprinkled with cinder toffee and chocolate dipped strawberries.

This was another excellent plate of food. Chocolate dipped strawberries, brownies and cinder toffee are three of my favourite dessert items and a trio of desserts is a winning way to end any meal.

The whole night was made extra awesome by the fabulous company, Holley's amazing slideshow of pictures of us having 'all of the fun', hula hooping on the roof (a skill I didn't know I had!) and Kieran's awesome vegan White Russians. 10 out of 10 lady! 

Today has been spent writing, dying my hair, baking banana bread & sorting through my pictures from Barcelona...hopefully I'll manage to get a blog post or three about that trip up soon.

How you doin'?!

Looking at my blog recently you'd think that I never spend any time in Brighton! I really do, I promise! Recently I've been getting involved with my local pro-choice group Brighton Pro-Choice, we've been campaigning against Abort 67 who come all the way from their church in Worthing to harass people trying to use the local bpas clinic, real nice guys, keeping it classy. We've done information stalls, handed out leaflets, gathered signatures for our petition and we also held a fundraiser where we made dinner & cupcakes and showed the film Vera Drake.

I also helped out with another local feminist groups campaign, Brighton Feminist Collective arranged a local 40 Days for Treats campaign to counter the anti-choicers 40 Days for Life campaign. Every day people took treats to the clinic and I contributed some Operation Icing cupcakes...

...Vanilla Thumbprint Cookies from The Vegan Cookie Connoisseur...

...and Isa's amazing Raspberry Truffle Brownies.

If you live in or around Brighton you can get involved in these campaigns too. This Thursday Brighton Feminist Collective are holding a Reclaim The Dance Floor fundraising night at The Blind Tiger with bands, DJ's, and stalls selling zines. Hopefully see you there! On April 15th Brighton Pro-Choice are holding a Carnival For Choice in Worthing, come along and make your pro-choice voice heard, details right here.

Just before I went away Veg Fest came to Brighton. Yay! I spent the first day hanging out with my PPK buddies eating food and then on Sunday I worked for the wonderful Ms Cupcake. Unfortunately all of this hanging out and working made me pretty slack at taking photos but there are a few. Me & Nick got there early on Saturday & my breakfast of choice was this tasty Black Forest cupcake from Sweetcheeks. It was a firm but moist gluten free treat and it actually made a great breakfast as the frosting wasn't too sweet.

After a walk around all of the stalls upstairs we went downstairs to see the lovely ladies from Veg Out. These guys are awesome and they catered our wedding so we always make sure to find them to say hi and to eat their delicious treats. This year they had loads of miniature food so of course we grabbed a plate to share.

We picked (clockwise from the back) the Avocado Lime Pudding, Chocolate Banana and Ginger Ganache, Sweet Potato Globe, Mini quiche, Frangipani Tart & a Mango Chocolate thing that I can't remember the name of. Everything was great but I think my favourites were the Avocado Lime Pudding and the Frangipani Tart. So damn good.

When lunchtime rolled around there wasn't a doubt in my mind about what I'd be eating, the fish & chips were top of my list! I'd never seen these guys at Veg Fest before & I was excited to try something new.

The fish was SO damn good, really, well, fishy! I went back for seconds.

There was plenty of other awesome food at the Fest, Vegusto were there with their plate of cheese samples, Amy's had samples of their soups, chilli, and more importantly, the gluten free Daiya mac & cheese. On Sunday I had a Wheaty kebab and a lot of Ms Cupcake treats, the new Peanut Butter Snap bars are to die for & I have a new favourite cupcake flavour, English Rose.