Vegan Practically

Every once in awhile I hear about a hidden gem that just takes plant-based dining experiences to a new level. I learned through the grapevine that an acquaintance of mine who lives about 90 minutes east of here, in Waterloo, comes to London (Ontario, just to be clear) monthly to attend a five-course, plant-based dessert tasting at a local plant-based chocolatier/creamery called Vaka. I know, right?

My first thought: Sign me up.

This post is going to be bittersweet because the very day after I attended, the owner announced a temporary closing as he modifies his business model. I’ll say a bit more about that later.

Vaka is a small operation under the charge of a brilliant chocolatier named Serge. I know the shop because people in the community vegan Facebook group rave about the ice cream. It is truly delicious. I have a litre of the “Creme Egg” flavour (Vanilla creme + cacao freckle + cacao truffles + sweet “yolk” ripple) in my freezer right now. But I had no idea about the dessert tastings, which have apparently been going for a couple of years.

The friend from out of town who told me about it invited me to join them for the tasting last Sunday. The menu changes every six weeks or so, with a new theme and new offerings. This month’s theme is Colours. The website describes it as follows: “Colours is the menu celebrating the coming of spring – an awakening of nature and senses, expressed in colour. Each dish tells its flavour story through naturally derived colours, from everyday ingredients to secret~stash~gems.” This is a thoughtful, well-conceived, and carefully planned tasting menu that is far from ordinary.

The dessert tasting is perhaps one of the most elevated eating experiences I’ve had ever, plant-based or otherwise. I felt as if I was being let in on a secret. The Colours menu consists of five courses each representing a colour: white, green, purple, gold, and red.

If you’ve ever been to a tasting anywhere, you’ll know that the best of them always include the part where the server offers a description of what is on your plate and, sometimes when needed, guidance on how best to eat it. This one followed that model, with a knowledgeable young woman providing an overview of what we were about to enjoy after each course had been placed on the table. I appreciated both the details of what I was about to eat and the suggestion of how to approach it.

First course: White — lychee, coconut, mexican vanilla creme, rice, mochi. It came in a little bowl and was a delight of flavours and textures. The ice cream might look like the main event, but everything worked together.

Second course: Green — avocado, makrut lime, hazelnut, cacao, pistachio, matcha, yuzu. This one had, to me, the most visual impact. It was designed to mimic a halved avocado in appearance, with a chocolate shell standing in for the skin and a small domed chocolate standing in for the pit. He placed it on a base of chopped pistachios for added taste and texture. The filling was creamy as velvet.

Third course: Purple — blue corn, blueberry, basil, cinnamon, hazelnut, butterfly creme. I’m not a food critic and I don’t have a talent for describing what is going on flavour-wise. But the blue course definitely presented the most interesting and unexpected flavour combinations. The blue corn was in the form of a soft tortilla, topped with the other ingredients. We were instructed to fold it in half like a taco and eat it with our hands. What an original and delicious dessert it was. Not overly sweet (indeed, nothing on the menu is too sweet, and Serge notes on his website that “sugar is used sparingly so the natural flavour comes first.”

Fourth course: Gold — waffle, dark maple syrup, Nuts for Cheese cream cheese, Nuts for Cheese butter, smoked sea salt, Honduras Copan cacao. If there was a “main course,” the taco and this might be competing for that spot. Serge has a great Instagram post about how he makes this waffle, cooking syrup right into it. It works. The cream cheese and butter cut the sweetness just the right amount.

Fifth and final course: Red — sour cherry, almond, panela, malwena strawberry, hibiscus, sudachi. This one was the hardest to photograph because all of my versions came out looking like a blood-spattered plate. After the taco and waffle, this was a light ending full of flavour. The hibiscus added a fragrant element and the strawberry tasted intensely fresh.

At the end of the fifth course Serge came by each table to introduce himself and ask us what we liked best and why. It was a welcome opportunity to reflect back on the experience as a whole. It was all outstanding and my favourite part was the green course, followed closely by the blue course.

It was a lot of dessert for a Sunday afternoon, and I’m glad of the instructions to treat it as a meal. We went at 1, so I had it instead of lunch.

The bittersweet ending of this story is that just as I discovered it, it is coming to an end. On Monday Serge announced on his Instagram that after putting heart and soul into the business for four years, working brutal hours and “trying to make a plant-based business work,” the model is not sustainable. He is hitting pause briefly to regroup and come back with a new approach.

I worry, based on reading between the lines, that the new model will not be fully plant-based. There was nothing about the dessert tasting, in my view, that wouldn’t be equally appealing to anyone who enjoys creative food, whether vegan or not. Indeed, one of the people I attended with, who had been six times before, is an omnivore. The main obstacle is probably the price, at $55 for the experience. It’s not at all over-priced for what you get, but it’s a tough sell even at the best of times, and we are not at the best of times right now. When I mentioned it to friends as a possible thing to do together (before I knew it was ending), they were enthusiastic until mentioned the price. I grant that it felt extravagant and special.

Around Easter there was a lot of news about the huge increase in the price of chocolate globally due to a short supply. It’s gone up 40% since November, and doubled over the last year. That is a tough increase for the makers of specialty handcrafted chocolates to bear. A radio report I heard last month said that many of these chocolatiers are finding that if they raise their prices to where they’d need them to be to return a profit, most people won’t pay it.

I’m sorry to see Serge feeling so defeated and deciding that his labour of love isn’t sustainable in its current form. But as the chorus of comments on his Instagram post attest, people love what he does and look forward to the next chapter. I for one am happy I got to experience the tasting menu, even if only once. And I’m keeping one eye on his Instragram for the next announcement.

With Serge in mind, I implore everyone to buy some plant-based chocolate from a local maker this weekend, wherever you are.

Bon Appétit!