Last night I had the pleasure of dining with Andrea from Celery In The City! It was a blast! Andrea and I finally met in the beginning of August, at the Healthy Living Summit (which I spoke about photography at!). New York City is pretty freakin’ close to New Haven, so when I had the opportunity to catch a ride there, I was not going to let it pass me by!
We met up around dinner time and headed right over to Candle 79 for our reservation. It’s been quite some time since I’ve dined there, and I was so excited! I love Candle 79 almost as much as I love Agent Dale Cooper (Twin Peaks, anyone?)- and I love him a lot. But anyway, back to the food.
We started off with an order of polenta fries to share. Oh, polenta fries. The last time I tried to make polenta fries, they were an epic disaster. These are incredible. The outside is crispy, while the inside is perfectly creamy and piping hot.
Pretty quickly after receiving our polenta fries, our entrees came up. I debated the specials, but decided upon something that I normally wouldn’t order- tempeh. I chose the Chipotle-Ginger Glazed Tempeh, which came stacked upon a pile of sauteed spinach, grilled squash, and topped with peach salsa. This dish really floored me! It was one of the tastiest meals I’ve had in a while. The tempeh was a bit smoky, with sweet undertones, while the squash was beautifully fresh and grilled to perfection.
Andrea went with the Moroccan Spiced Chickpea Cake, which was served alongside a tower of seasonal vegetables (potato and broccoli, I believe), red pepper-coconut curry, and was topped with apricot chutney and toasted almonds. Andrea let me snag a bite or two– I was super impressed with this dish as well! Like the polenta fries, the chickpea cake was crisp on the outside and was soft and flavorful in the middle. Paired with the fresh apricot chutney, the whole plate really came together.
I can only speak for myself, but even though I was so stuffed, there was no way I was passing up dessert! We decided to share the Mexican Chocolate Brownie. Wow! I knew this was going to be good- I mean, how could it not?- but damn, Candle 79 really knows how to do brownies. The brownie was accompanied by caramelized banana, coconut ice cream, toasted pecans, chocolate-ancho sauce. It was rich, decadent, and delicious!
Ah! Looking at this photo has got me seriously drooling. Oh, and while we were mowing down this treat, Jennifer Garner walked in! I’m not really one to get too excited over celebrities, but she is pretty cool.
Anyway, following dinner, we walked like 10 million miles down to Union Square and sat and talked for a while! Sadly, I had to head out and get back to the train. Every time I go to New York City I want to move there again! It seems like there is always something really great going on there.
Carrot cake rules. If I had to choose one kind of cake to eat for the rest of my life, it’d definitely be carrot cake. I found a carrot cake recipe on VegWeb.com and got myself into the kitchen to make them for a potluck I had planned on attending. I ended up not going to the potluck because I felt way too sick, but I still got to eat lots of cupcakes, so the day wasn’t all a loss.
This recipe is really, really good and so simple- it’d be unfair not to share it with y’all!
1/2 cup canola oil (I subbed in 1/2 cup melted margarine ’cause I had no buttah)
1/2 cup apple sauce
3 tablespoons ground flax mixed with 8 tablespoons water
3 cups shredded carrot
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger to taste
First, I preheated the oven to 350 degrees. Next, I combined the flax seed and water and whisked until it was thoroughly combined and a bit frothy looking. In a large bowl, I combined the flax “eggs” with the rest of the wet ingredients (including carrot). To the wet ingredients, I sifted in the dry ingredients and mixed until totally combined. Yeah. That’s it! Super easy. Oh, then bake!
I baked the carrot cake in the cupcake form because it’s just so much cuter than a cake- and cuteness factor is important to me. The cupcakes took about a half hour to bake, but my oven seems to be a bit wacky- you might want to check on them every 15 minutes until they’re done.
I just frosted these with a standard vegan butter cream frosting! Perfect.
I’m back! I missed blogging here at Another One Bites The Crust. It just wasn’t the same at the new blog, so I’ve decided to come back here for good. Another One Bites The Crust is my baby! For now, I’ll just re-post a few of the posts I made at the other blog just to get back into the swing of things here!
This summer has been so wild when it comes to traveling. North Carolina, a failed attempt into Canada (maybe I’ll get into that in another post..), and now I’m blogging to you from Orlando, Florida! I’ve been spending time with family here in Florida and I couldn’t have asked for a nicer trip. We’re staying at someone’s beautiful house and it’s just so lovely!
However, it wasn’t only the family-time that brought me to Florida this week. It was the opening of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter!!! We woke up quite early to snag a spot close to the front of line. Apparently, we didn’t rise early enough because we had to wait at least 40 minutes to get in when the park opened! It was absolutely insane. The line wrapped around the area surrounding the Harry Potter part, spilling over past Jurassic Park!
It was worth all the waiting when I turned the corner and caught a glimpse of Hogwarts!
Oh my gosh. I’ve been waiting so long for this day! I’ve been reading Harry Potter books since I was 10, and finally at 21, I’m able to experience the world of Harry Potter in real life! We rushed right over to the Forbidden Journey ride and waited in line for close to two hours. I was getting pretty restless, but it was worth all the waiting when we entered the castle. Unfortunately I had to leave my camera outside of the castle, but the inside of Hogwarts is amazing! All the details, from the House Points counter, the talking paintings, potted Mandrakes.. it’s incredible! The ride itself is incredible as well. I don’t even know how to describe it!
After experiencing Hogwarts, I wandered around for a bit and browsed some of the less-crowded shops. I stopped in Honeydukes and I planned to buy some candies, but I figured they’d all melt before I left. We’re heading back tomorrow, so I’ll hopefully get to pick some up then! I tried to wait in line at Olivander’s wand shop, but I gave up after waiting for an hour. It was just too hot and I wanted to join everyone else with lunch.
We ventured out of the Harry Potter area and into Jurassic Park for some vegan food. The options were quite limited, but there was veggie burgers and fruit, paired with pumpkin juice from the Wizarding World of Harry Potter!! The pumpkin juice was AWESOME! It tasted exactly like pumpkin pie. I want to make my own soon. I also made a little salad out of shredded lettuce and pickles. I did what I had to do.
We checked out the rest of the park for a little, but it was getting way to hot to stay in direct sunlight for much longer. We’ll be heading back into Universal Studios tomorrow, and I’m really hoping I’ll be able to experience quite a bit more Harry Potter delightfulness!
I sauteed the onion, bell pepper, and garlic in a medium-sized pan, with a little olive oil to coat the bottom and prevent everything from sticking. When the vegetables were softened, I crumbled in the tofu. After crumbling the tofu in, I seasoned the whole thing with salt and pepper. I cooked it all together for about five more minutes before adding in the rest of the seasonings. I don’t have exact measurements for these, but basically I just used enough turmeric to turn all of the tofu yellow and seasoned with the rest of the spices, to taste.
I served the tofu scramble along with some potatoes that I boiled, then browned in a large skillet with some olive oil, salt, pepper, and this random seasoning mix that I found in my parent’s cabinet. I topped it all with a few avocado slices, just to add a little more flavor.
I think that this came out pretty well! One of my sisters is also a vegan, so she’s used to (and likes) tofu, but the rest of my family is always a bit apprehensive when it comes to it. Rather, apprehensive to eating it when it’s disguised in a chocolate pudding recipe- I don’t know one person who can’t get down with that. But anyway, I digress. We all enjoyed this dish a whole bunch- including the tofu-shy ones.
I accidentally deleted a bunch of stuff off my site- recent posts, new & old photographs, links- and I’m working on getting it all back, but I hope I can get this all figured out soon! Just thought I’d let you know what’s going on!
I woke up fairly late by my standards on Monday! Not late enough though, to miss brunch at Herbivore. Not many people I know in San Fran are fans of Herbivore, but it was close by Melisser’s apartment and I was seriously craving a tofu scramble.
So that’s what I got- the southwestern tofu scramble. I had the best tofu scramble of my life, also of the southwestern flavored variety, at Vita Cafe in Portland last August, so this scramble had a lot to live up to. It wasn’t nearly as tasty as the Portland tofu scramble, but it was pretty satisfying. It was served with breakfast potatoes (YUM!), guacamole, salsa, black beans, and cornbread. I wasn’t too impressed with the cornbread, but I would gladly eat everything else again.
Immediately following breakfast, we headed over to where the park so that I could see the Full House house. As Melisser and I were walking up the hill, she said she had seen the cast on the hill! I immediately started looking around for Bob Sagat, but then I realized that it was only a cardboard cut out. Still pretty good! Of course, we had to take a photo.
Too funny! She also showed me this really neat garden project over there, where the plants are nestled in shoes that others have left behind. It seems like a really cool idea and it’s really quite beautiful.
After our stroll in the park, we headed back to the apartment to pick up Strummer, play with the kitties, and head back out to run some errands. Oh, and I had a dinner date with a bunch of fabulous SF ladies!
On our way there, we wandered into a little alley filled with some brilliant street art. Check it out!
I wish I took more pictures over there- it was just so neat! There is just so much creativity brewing in San Francisco. It is truly inspiring! But yes, back to my dinner date. I met up with Erin of Vegan Homemade, Megan of Such a Vegan, and her sister, Kelly. We met at Gracias Madre, a Mexican vegan restaurant. It was such a pleasure to meet these spectacular bloggers! I’m so grateful that I was able to meet so many wonderful people on this trip. I’m really thankful for the blogging world bringing me together with so many great friends!
Plus, the food here was out of control. I ordered a combination plate, which consisted of black beans, rice, kale, and roasted butternut squash- served up with some fresh corn tortillas. Oh. My. Gosh. I couldn’t get over how creamy, flavorful, and STRAIGHT UP PERFECT the beans were. I don’t know how they do it! I’ve never had beans that tasted so good before. Gracias Madre is doing something right!
We had planned to go to Maggie Mudd’s for ice cream after, but decided to stay at the restaurant for dessert. Good choice! I ordered the seasonal fruit crisp, which turned out to be strawberry. Almost as good as my meal! It was served up alongside a scoop of ice cream- I think it was dulce de leche flavored.
Sadly, I eventually had to part ways with everyone. Thank you ladies for coming out with me! I had such a blast and I can’t wait to see you all again soon After dinner, Melisser picked me up and we thought it’d be a good idea to head over to Maggie Mudd’s anyway. Hey, it was an indulgent night. I’m all for it. I went all out with my sundae at Maggie Mudd’s. A freshly made waffle bowl, two scoops of vegan ice cream- chocolate peanut butter and cookies and cream- marshmallow creme, whipped topping, and nuts. Out of this world. The picture doesn’t do it justice!
The rest of the night, until I fell asleep a bit prematurely, was spent prepping (or watching Melisser prep) for the upcoming big day-cookbook photoshoot!
Part three of my California adventure! I’m still in LA at this point of the trip, waking up with excitement at the thought of Babycakes for breakfast.
Oh hello there. Now that’s a good breakfast! I ordered the cran-apple toastie. It’s a lovely, gluten-free quick bread, with a band of crunchy stuff swirled throughout and also on top! It was just as good as it looked. See that little pocket of apple? Perfect! It paired very, very well with the soy cappuccino in the background.
Nora ordered this biscuit with jam. This baby is HUGE and oh so tasty. It’s made of spelt and I could not tell you what flavor jam was in there. So much food, I’m starting to forget what everything was! But yeah, so I could not leave Babycakes empty handed! I chose two flavors of cupcake-brownie and carrot- to bring over to Melisser, as a thank you for hosting me and showing me around San Francisco.
It turned out to be a good choice, mostly. The brownie cupcake was delicious, but the carrot cake was just alright. Anyway, Nora and I lingered around Babycakes for quite some time before sadly parting ways. I had to catch a bus to San Fran! I miss her already and I hope to see my BBF (best blogging friend!) soon! Have I told you that we’re going to India together in the fall? Yep!
I turned up to the bus station a bit early, so I ate the lunch I had packed to bring on the bus with me a little early, mostly out of boredom.
Boooooring! Good thing I packed something though, we stopped half way through the trip, from LA to SF, at a Burger King. Gross! Nothing I wanted to eat there, so I sprinted across the street to a gas station and picked up another Clif bar, carrot cake flavor, because I started to feel hungry again. The silly part of the Burger King stop was that minutes after we pulled back onto the highway, we passed the most gnarly, smelly, gross cow factory farm I’d ever seen. Weird!
The ride was mostly boring- but in a good way. I had been go-go-go nonstop since I’d gotten to California and it was pretty nice to relax for a little. It went by really fast, too. That is, until we got to the last two hours- those went by very slow! I was really anxious to get there at that point. We did pass this really cool mountain stuff on the way there. The colors were incredible! Eventually, the sun started to set (like it always does..) and I was able to get a really beautiful shot of a plane landing!
I was really, really happy to get off the bus in San Francisco! However, I was so surprised by the temperature change from LA. I knew it was going to be colder, but sheesh, it was freezing! Like I mentioned in the last post, I packed super light and a jacket did not make the cut. Whoops! Good thing Melisser was there to pick me up, so I didn’t have to wait around in the cold for too long. I’d met Melisser once before in New York City and it was great to see her again! She’s one heck of a tour guide, by the way. I didn’t miss a thing! We were both pretty hungry so we hit up Cha-Ya, a vegan Japanese restaurant in San Francisco. It. Was. Awesome. I ordered two rolls of sushi and Melisser shared some noodles with me. I have pictures, but they came out really bad so I’m not going to post them. No worries though (but honestly, would you really worry?), I did go back to Cha-Ya later in the week and I’ve got some rad photos from that.
After dinner, we ran around like crazy people looking for vegan donuts. Sadly, Whole Foods didn’t have any good flavors, but we did manage to find some at a little health food shop! One thing I realized about San Francisco is that these people love doughnuts. There’s doughnut shops everywhere, it seems. I even saw a place that sold only Chinese food and doughnuts. That’s my kind of city! I love doughnuts too. It’s my dream to open a doughnut shop. Vegan, of course.
Gosh, I have so much more San Francisco fun to write about! Before I go, I will tell you that I’ve totally fallen in love with the city. I need to move there!
One more thing! In case you missed, I posted part one and part two of my California adventure here and here!
Now, where did I leave off? Right right.. my third day in California was spent hanging around the town that Nora goes to school in, which is about 40 minutes outside of LA. It was a really great change of pace, as the previous two days in the immediate LA area were pretty intense! We took our time getting ready in the morning and eventually headed out into the nearby town for some lunch and to browse the shops.
We stopped into a small cafe, of which I cannot remember it’s name, and ate some pretty basic salads for lunch. I was craving a tofu scramble, but they had stopped serving breakfast and had no desire to take out the ingredients to make little ol’ me one. Oh well! After lunch, we hit up the local gluten-free shop! Yeah! This little town had a shop full of gluten-free, mostly vegetarian stuff. I picked up a gluten-free carrot cake flavored bar and some fun ginger peanut butter chews. So fun!
On the way back to Nora’s school, we stopped by the campus farm! How cool is that? We ate lots of fruit and vegetables straight from the gardens. All those tropical fruit trees always amaze me! I know that I’m really easily excited, but I was kind of over the top with how excited I was to eat fun fruits off the trees.
What else? Oh! I took photos of Nora for her senior portraits! That was quite fun too. I’m super lucky to always have such photogenic friends to take pictures of! It makes my job so easy. We just kinda hung around for the rest of the day, taking more photos, eating dinner in the dining hall, and I got to fall asleep to the sounds of Nora’s lovely guitar skills.
So yeah, the next day we woke up kinda early and headed into LA to meet Alix and friends for lunch at Pure Luck! Everything about this was just so much fun. It was really great to meet Alix, Shawn and the rest of their buddies. Every time I meet a new internet friend in real life, it just seems like I’ve know them forever. I can’t wait to hang out with them again! It sucks that we all live so far away!
But anyway, so Nora and I got into LA a bit too early, so we headed downtown to hang out and to get coffee at Spring for Coffee. The cappuccino there was really tasty, but not as good at Intelligentsia! We also stopped into this other little coffee shop so that I could use the bathroom, because I have the bladder the size a dime. Seriously. Ask Nora how many times I made her stop whatever we were doing to find any restroom. It’s kind of crazy. But yeah, that other little shop, I think called LA Cafe, had a lot of delicious baked treats. Sadly, none were vegan.
After all that, it was finally time to meet up at Pure Luck!
(photo from Little Vegan Planet- I had to take it for this post.. we all just look too cool.)
Not only was the company amazing, the food at Pure Luck was really good! I knew that I had to try the jackfruit “carnitas”, which is jackfruit, prepared some way (descriptive, aren’t I?) to make it sort of meaty and all kinds of delicious. I ordered the jackfruit tacos which were really freakin’ amazing. Besides the cilantro, I could have lived without that. Oh, and we also ordered a few appetizers to share! Fried pickles, fries, and potato pals (fried gnocchi). Everything was really great. My favorite out of all the apps are definitely the fried pickles. I can never turn those down!
Pure Luck just so happens to be right across from Scoops- an ice cream shop that offers four vegan flavors daily. On that particular day, they offered cookies ‘n cream, almond-date, chocolate-vanilla, and something molasses. I tried each one, and decided to order the almond and date one. Good choice! It was wonderful- super creamy and full of flavor.
It was really sad to part ways with Alix! I can’t wait until we can all get together again. I’m thinking Green in Arizona. That’d be a fun trip! But yes, we parted ways and Nora and I headed over to Melrose to walk around, explore some shops, and eat dinner at M Cafe. We found a lot of fun shops to keep us busy for a few hours- including a flower shop to take photos, Johnny Cupcakes store, and a very overpriced vintage t-shirt shop.
Eventually we were hungry enough to eat dinner and went right over to M Cafe. That place is really cool! The menu is all macrobiotic and mostly vegan. Ever since I’ve seen the M Chopped Salad on other vegan blogs, I have been drooling over it. I couldn’t wait to get here to eat that. See, I told you.. I’m easily excitable.
LA food is just incredible. I wish I could eat it every day! We spent the night in LA at a fancy-schmancy hotel downtown, so that I could get to the bus station really easily. It was a very relaxing evening of comfy hotel beds, SNL, and a mission to get fresh fruit. I couldn’t have asked for a better last night of the trip in LA!
I’ll be back soon with a post about Babycakes LA and the trip to San Francisco! See you soon
Hey y’all! After 12 hours of travel from Wednesday night to Thursday morning, I’ve finally arrived back in Connecticut! California was a BLAST! I’m under the impression that it’s impossible for anyone to visit California and not fall in love with it. I’m already planning my trip back to the west (best?) coast. Sure, the east coast has it’s charm, but there is something about California that just feels so comfortable for me! I’ve been thinking that the best way for me to post about my trip would be to break it up into a few different posts, covering two or three days in each post. I took photos of, you know, EVERYTHING, so they are going to be some epic posts!
sitting on the floor of the airport
Naturally, I’m starting off from the beginning! I arrived at the airport pretty early and sat around forever until it was time to board the plane. The first flight was from LaGaurdia to Philly, then Philly to Los Angeles! Both flights were fine, nothing to complain about! I did eat some decent meals in both airports, but I don’t have the photos! Too bad. In Laguardia I ate a hearty breakfast of tofu, vegetables, and rice. It was standard greasy food-court fare, but nice that they actually served tofu. In Philly, I located an Au Bon Pain and opted for a gluten-free, vegan soup and salad. I was starving when I arrived in LA, but decided to head to the hostel I was staying at before going out in search for food.
I wish I took a photo of the van that pulled up to bring me to the hostel. The van had balloons painted on the side and in huge, red letters “PARTY PARTY PARTY” was written. I knew instantly that is was going be a good trip. Dr. Dre was blasting through the speakers as we headed out of the airport and into Inglewood. The hostel was a little sketchy, but it cost me about 15 bucks to stay there, so no complaining from me! I wandered down the streets when I arrived until I found something that caught my eye. It was pretty late at this point, and most places were closed. I did find this hole-in-the-wall Indian spot and I was so impressed with the food! I ordered Chana Masala with rice. SO GOOD. It was super spicy, just how I like it.
After devouring the food, I headed back to the hotel and called it a night. Well, I tried to call it a night. The British frat dudes and ladies I was sharing the room with had a different idea. This idea was to teach the rest of the room to play Marco Polo at 2 am. Yes, Marco Polo. In our room.
The hostel boasted free breakfast, but when I arrived to the breakfast spot, all they were offering were non-vegan blueberry muffins. Lame! I decided to just order from the menu and eat in their dining room so that I could multi-task and try to figure out the LA bus system.
The oatmeal was gross, but the breakfast potatoes were delicious. Anything with ketchup is delicious, though. But yeah, I was full and ready to conquer the buses. It took about an hour, but I eventually made it into the city! I ended up on La Brea, where I spotted Buffalo Exchange from the bus window and requested the driver stop. I’ve heard so much about Buffalo Exchange and I had to see it. It was like, 8am, so it was closed when I got off. I just hung around in the neighbourhood for a while, stopped at a coffee shop to study/practice sign language, wandered around a really weird flea market type motel, I think.
Soon enough, Buffalo Exchange was open and then Nora from Pride & Vegudice picked me up! But before Nora picked me up, I spent so much time rummaging through racks at Buffalo Exchange. I don’t buy clothes too often, and I don’t feel too guilty buying used clothes, so I was so excited to be there. Plus, I had only brought one pair of pants and four shirts to California with me. How’s that for packing light? It costs money to check baggage now and I am so not into that. I ended up leaving Buffalo Exchange with a really cute dress and two pairs of pants. Anyway, so Nora and I have been e-friends for quite some time now and this was our first time meeting. Honestly, getting into her car for the first time was like an old friend was picking me up! It feels like we’ve known each other for years and years! We drove into Santa Monica for lunch at Real Food Daily and some beach exploration.
Real Food Daily represents what LA vegan is, in my opinion. Fresh, healthy, and delicious! Everything on the menu sounded delightful, but I opted for the Mexicali salad.
The base of the salad consists of crisp, romaine lettuce and is topped with cucumber, celery, corn, beans, tomato, avocado, and crispy tortillas. To finish it all off, it’s coated in a cilantro-lime dressing. I don’t like cilantro, so I could have done without the dressing- but overall, I really loved the flavors and different textures of the salad!
Properly fueled, we headed down to the beach! I’m still in awe of how beautiful the Santa Monica pier is. The shoreline is just gorgeous and it was a perfect day for a photo adventure with Nora. It’s so nice to hang out with other photographers/bloggers who are just as obsessed with food and photo-taking as I am!
All this photo-taking sure takes a lot of energy out of a lady! We agreed it was definitely time for coffee- but not just any coffee. We wanted the best cofffee we could get in LA, and after reading a lot of Yelp reviews on my phone, we headed out of Santa Monica and into Silverlake for Intelligentsia! Besides the steep coffee prices, Intelligenstsia ia great. The atmosphere is fun and hip, the baristas are friendly, and the coffee is outstanding. Nora ordered a very lovely cappuccino and I went boring and just got a regular ol’ coffee. Should have ordered the cappuccino!
Another selling point for Intelligentsia, the place is covered in llama art. Yeah. Llama art! It’s so sweet. I’m guessing they are by a local artist, and she RULES. I really love llamas.
It turns out, we were already in a very vegan friendly area, so we decided to stay in Silverlake for dinner. We were surrounded by quite a few wonderful spots, but we narrowed it down to Cru or Flore. Cru won out, with their simple and fresh menu.
We ordered a raw appetizer, bruschetta, which I was not too wild about; I really don’t like raw cashew cheese, but I think that if you do like it, you’d love this dish. Hey run on sentence! I did, however, LOVE my entree! We both ordered the Body Ecology Bowl, which is kabocha squash, spinach, and quinoa paired with a little salad and topped with sauerkraut. Each of these pieces were really delicious on their own, but I did find the dressing on the salad and the sauerkraut to be quite out of place. It seemed a little random to me!
Phew, what a day! We spent the rest of the night just hanging out and watching Survivor at Nora’s university. I was wiped! Okay, so this post is really long so I’m going to stop it here, but I think I’ll try to get another post up about the rest of my LA stay within the next couple days (or even tonight, if I’m feeling it), followed by my journey to San Francisco!
I'm Nicole Carpenter, a photographer and blogger from New Haven, CT. I like to write about my adventures with animals, vegan food, and photography. I hope you enjoy!
If you have any questions or comments, feel free to email me at carpentern2@gmail.com
After dinner, Melisser picked me up and we thought it’d be a good idea to head over to Maggie Mudd’s anyway. Hey, it was an indulgent night. I’m all for it. I went all out with my sundae at Maggie Mudd’s. A freshly made waffle bowl, two scoops of vegan ice cream- chocolate peanut butter and cookies and cream- marshmallow creme, whipped topping, and nuts. Out of this world. The picture doesn’t do it justice!
(photo from 
