Being vegan doesn’t mean that you have to settle for below average sweets. Although vegan desserts are not made with cow’s milk or eggs, vegan desserts can still be just as mouth watering as ‘regular’ desserts. If you have been struggling to find that great vegan cookie, pie, ice-cream, or donut, here is a list of the top 12 dessert spots in LA.
Amara Kitchen is a charming café located in the Garvanza area of Highland Park that focuses on organic food, serving breakfast, lunch, dinner, and some great vegan desserts. Enjoy both indoor and outdoor seating while digging into the dark chocolate tart, buckwheat and date chocolate cake, gluten-free rosemary and fig scones, and gluten-free salted chocolate chip cookies.
Blue Star Donuts made its way down from Portland in fall of 2015. The donuts are made from a classic brioche recipe, which means the dough is made from scratch every day and takes about 18 hours to make. Along with favorites like the Blueberry Bourbon & Basil, Blue Star also offers a selection of delicious, seasonal vegan cake donuts. Expect choices like blueberry cake with classic blueberry bourbon basil glaze, sugar & spice cake, and a mimosa donut, a champagne-infused donut with a champagne glaze and orange marmalade.
Brite Spot's vegan apple pie and coconut cupcake. | Courtesy of Brite Spot
Brite Spot
Echo Park’s Brite Spot has served great diner food since 1949. In red vinyl booths and along a classic, stainless steel counter, diners enjoy American comfort food like patty melts, hamburgers, omelets, and pancakes. Brite Spot is also well known for its pastry and cookie case, with a number of delicious vegan dessert items. There’s a vegan apple pie (available by the slice or whole to take away), vegan coconut cupcakes, vegan banana muffins, and vegan ginger cookies.
CREAM serves up vegan banana chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin cookies, and chocolate fudge cookies with soy mint chocolate chip ice cream and soy vanilla ice cream. Located near the campus of USC, CREAM is a fun spot that is open late and makes customized ice cream sandwiches with seemingly endless combinations of cookies, ice cream, and toppings.
Erin McKenna's Bakery's exterior and cupcakes. | Photo credit: Frank McKenna
Erin McKenna’s Bakery
Erin McKenna’s Bakery is an all vegan, gluten-free, kosher bakery that is also soy and nut sensitive. Serving up classics such as old fashioned cake donuts (dressed up in all sorts of glazes and toppings) and spongy, dense, moist lemon teacake, it’s no surprise that even those who aren’t following any dietary restrictions or aren’t afflicted by allergies also become regulars at the bakery.
Kippys! Organic Non-Dairy Ice Cream! is a vegan creamery that serves scoops of non-dairy dessert. Kippy’s! makes its own coconut cream and uses raw honey or dates as a sweetener, which leaves each scoop rich, creamy, and delightful. Try favorites like the double dark chocolate with vanilla date or vanilla cappuccino with coconut honey, and top your scoop with a chocolate magic shell and raw salted caramel. Kippy’s! sweet treats have a place in any diet.
Menchie’s offers vegan, dairy-free alternatives, including a coconut milk flavor in addition to its lineup of fruit sorbets. The vegan-friendly froyo spot is home to a variety of tasty sorbets, including sweet pink lemonade sorbet, fudgy chocolate sorbet, and even the Disneyland favorite Pineapple Dole Whip soft serve. Menchie’s also offers an assortment of fresh fruits and dairy-free toppings like nuts, Oreos, and sprinkles.
After being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that forced her onto a plant based diet, Chef Susan Sbicca used her award winning talents to create an amazing non-dairy, egg free, soy free, gluten free treat: Millie’s Vegan Gelato. Using only the freshest vegan ingredients, Millie’s comes in a variety of delicious flavors like lemon raspberry cheesecake and mocha almond fudge butter. It even caters to those with nut allergies, with the mouthwatering vanilla coconut and strawberry coconut cream. This one of a kind gelato can be found at Erewhon Market, Beaming, Alfred Coffee, and Whole Foods locations throughout Southern California.
Although Moon Juice is known for juices and moon milks, it also offers ‘cosmic provisions,’ or put simply, delicious sweets. These cosmic provisions are an expanding selection of 100 per cent organic, sprouted, and raw sweets, including puddings, cookies, and confections that will seduce even the most sophisticated palate. With locations in Venice and Silverlake, vegans on both the westside and eastside of town can enjoy chocolate dipped cookies, chaga donuts, and maca walnut bundles.
Peddler’s Creamery serves award winning artisan organic ice cream created in house with a unique, bicycle churning process. Among many other features, its award-winning interior space features a bicycle kinetic sculpture that churns ice cream. The most popular items include scoops of Mexican chocolate, candied ginger, and cardamom. Vegan flavors change daily and cones and chocolate sauce are also vegan and made in house.
Los Angeles’s home grown, small batch ice cream shop Sweet Rose Creamery churns out seasonal treats using organic products and farmers’ market produce. The menu from executive chef and co-owner Shiho Yoshikawa consists of imaginative, homespun frozen desserts made from the highest quality ingredients available. In addition to popular ice cream flavors like old fashioned vanilla and fresh mint with house made chocolate chips, the shop also offers a variety of vegan friendly options like coconut chocolate sorbet, yuzu lemon, and pomegranate grapefruit in five Los Angeles locations.
Yoga-urt is LA’s first all-vegan and organic soft serve store. Yoga-urt’s smooth and creamy soft serve is made fresh onsite from an almond and cashew base. Popular, rotating flavors of organic, dairy-free, gluten-free, soy-free, and kosher soft serve include chocolate bliss, salted caramel zen, and peanut butter prana with four strains of live probiotics added for digestive and immune health. For those who like their Yoga-urt in a cone, cones are handcrafted from scratch and are vegan and gluten-free. Don’t forget the toppings bar with many options such as vegan gummy bears, chocolate chips, strawberries, and dried mulberries.
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