The former vegan in me wants you to know about this: there's to be a vegan bake sale on Friday, April 25, on the second floor of the CCC building at UIC. Amanda takes classes there, and brought home a flier because she knew I'd be interested. I'm never on the UIC campus, being four years out of college and all, but I wanted to let other people know, since vegan baked goods are hard to come by, especially good ones.

Time to be honest about vegan baking. In general, it's going to be sub-par to most dairy-enriched cakes, pies, cookies, and brownies. Eggs just make for a better texture than potato starch, bananas, applesauce, silken tofu, or anything else used as a substitute. The inferior quality of most vegan baked goods was something I readily admitted to as a vegan; to eat the way that was right for my body (at the time), I was willing to accept mediocre baking, make sacrifices.

Note that the above statement is definitely not true of vegan food in general, which can be wonderful and flavour-filled. To me, the "this tastes vegan" factor is strictly a baked goods thang. And there are exceptions to every rule, of course. Blind Faith Cafe in Evanston makes a chocolate cake that Doesn't Taste Vegan, and Jen is one of the best vegan bakers I know - though she has developed her skills through extensive trial and error. Atom told me that the Pink Bloque also does a good vegan bake sale, though I have yet to experience it. And Treasure Island's bakery makes vegan chocolate chip cookies; everything else they sell there is high-quality, so I'd bet that their vegan baking is pretty good, too.

Anyway, Friday's vegan bake sale is being held by Free Society, and goes from 11am-2pm. The flier says proceeds will go to starting up a Food Not Bombs chapter, which is something I'd support. So if you're vegan and in the area on Friday, check them out.