Aotearoa New Zealand is home to plenty of innovative vegan baking and desserts. Madeleine Crutchley talks to three makers who are taking on traditionally dairy-heavy recipes to make satisfying plant-based sweet treats.
There are valued contributors to Aotearoa’s vegan dessert scene who have come and gone (leaving cravings in their
The Bitch Baker, helmed by Lei Timo, served steaming trays of panipopo, lush German chocolate cakes and NYC-style chocolate chip cookies.
Bryone Vonk adopted French patisserie techniques to develop millefeuille and brioche for The Good Baker.
Kaiaroha Vegan Deli and Eatery developed the ‘freakshake’ - indulgent and precariously loaded (not-milk) shakes.
However, a handful of bakers and makers based in Tāmaki Makaurau continue to draw on and push these innovations forward. From ice cream to pastries and cakes, they’ve figured out how to emulate and innovate desserts and sweet treats that traditionally rely on the enriching flavours of butter, cream and eggs.
What drives their appetite for sugary, plant-based desserts? Notably, a desire for everyone to gather around during celebratory occasions.
Neat Cakes
Neat Cakes, run by owner-operator Jack Orsbourn, has existed in many iterations since the baker turned 18. Jack’s interest in vegan baking arose after noticing a friend was missing out on sweet treats.
“My best friend went vegan, and then we’d go to parties and they couldn’t eat the cake. That’s where it started.”
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Advertise with NZME.Jack worked to create vegan buttercream, a chocolate cake batter and a vanilla cake, and then continued to develop unique flavour combinations from those three base recipes. Neat Cakes began as an Instagram account and, over the last 10 years, Jack has run the business as a wholesale operation, a market stall and a made-to-order service.
Now, she has added cafe service to that list. On Dominion Rd, Jack serves cake and coffee from a spot decorated with black and white checkerboard floors and small flourishes of colour. This includes the rosy pink coffee machine, which, Jack explains quite seriously, is the item that pushed her to open the spot in the first place.
Neat Cake’s loyal customer base is drawn to the spot because it caters to various dietary requirements.
“The biggest thing I’ve found is allergens. People are dairy-free or gluten-free, or both dairy- and gluten-free. They struggle to find things, so this takes the barrier away.”
Jack’s methods of making take inspiration from a wide range of bakers – a shelf packed with cookbooks in the cafe proves her wide pool of references. Early on, bakeries in the UK like Primrose and Lily Vanilli were influential. Now, allergen-friendly New York cake shop From Lucie is a reference point (the cakes here are sculptural and adorned with flowers), as is Melbourne-based vegan chef Shannon Martinez (whose punk-ish creations are imprecise and indulgent).
Jack says her time working at Bluebells Cakery in Auckland and Miss Ladybird Cakes in Melbourne also influenced her skillset and approach to vegan baking.
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Advertise with NZME.Jack considers their caramelised cornflake cake “the star of the show” at Neat Cakes, highlighting its complex, contrasting flavours.
“It’s just perfect. It’s salty, it’s crunchy, it’s sweet, it’s nostalgic. It makes you feel okay about eating cake for breakfast.”
This recipe took inspiration from Christina Tosi of Milk Bar (previously known as Momofuku Milk Bar). Milk Bar’s sweet treats are known for their maximalist, cartoonish aesthetics and their childhood inspiration. Notably, they are not vegan – Jack’s spin is.
To emulate and “veganise” these desserts, Jack approaches ingredients from a molecular level.
“I’ve got a traditional background. I know how butter works, I know what it’s meant to do. You’ve got to break down the ingredients into what the properties are.”
They consider the function of an ingredient and substitutes based on its purpose in a specific recipe. Eggs, for example, might be swapped for psyllium husk (to bind) or aquafaba (to make meringues or Italian meringue buttercream). Jack says it’s a process that has chemistry in mind.
All of this experimentation is done to bring people together for a moment of celebration.
“For me, it’s that everyone at the table can eat the cake – that’s my driving force for everything I do. I’m trying to make it as inclusive and welcoming as possible.”
Neat Cakes, 218 Dominion Rd, Mount Eden. Neatcakes.co.nz
Maison Des Lys
Drissilla David, who was born and raised in France, started experimenting with vegan pastry recipes after making the dietary change herself. However, she struggled to find suitable versions of the flaky, golden treats she loved in Paris.
“I think we might have had a couple of raw vegan dessert places. Nothing like a proper pastry.”
After she immigrated to Aotearoa in 2015, Driss continued to develop plant-based recipes, trying to find a version that would fulfil her croissant cravings. In 2017, Driss enrolled in an online course led by French vegan pastry chef Linda Vongdara.
“It was a pretty basic course but it was a good foundation ... From there, I started researching all the ways I could make vegan food that wouldn’t taste vegan.”
Over three years, Driss continued to trial recipes in her free time, taking in information from library books and online sources. The goal was to achieve a proper French croissant. Then, after welcoming her first baby in 2019 and launching into lockdowns during her maternity leave, she began more purposeful development with the support of her partner.
Maison des Lys launched in 2020 with a stall at The Shed Collective markets, a hub for vegan fare that pops up in Oratia every Saturday. The Grey Lynn store opened to queues in 2022 (a few doors down from Phillippa Stevenson’s formative Tart Bakery). The second location in Mount Eden has also welcomed crowds.
Croissants are the pastry that Driss seeks to hero at Maison des Lys. They’re also quite the challenge for a vegan baker: butter has played an integral role in the pastry since its inception.
Croissants are a viennoiserie pastry, which means they are made through a process called lamination – a slab of butter is rolled into a puff pastry dough, which is then folded to multiply the layers. When baked, water contained in the folds of butter vaporises to create contrasting layers, frying the dough to create the defining flaky texture of the pastry.
This means the success of Driss’ trials has always been heavily dependent on her butter substitutions.
“[At the beginning] we had a baker’s fat, margarine, and it wasn’t as good in taste.”
After a series of tests, Driss concocted her own buttery blend. It used a combination of almond paste, cocoa butter and coconut oil.
“That also worked, but was really expensive.”
Now Maison des Lys uses Naturli, a vegan butter made in Denmark. A brief period of importing issues for this crucial ingredient led Driss to develop other staples of the patisserie.
“We had a time where for a whole month we had no butter. It wasn’t coming into the country, so we had no product. That’s when we had to develop the brioche and tarts.”
Another common swap for the pastries and baked goods sees Driss use potato protein, whipping it into meringue batter for their macarons and garnishing mousse. A lentil-based cream enriches the texture. Soy milk is her preferred ‘dairy’.
The croissants succeed in emulating those important flaky layers. In a sweet addition, the outside of the pastry is brushed with a light, subtle glaze to enhance its crispness.
Driss says she’s proud to challenge the perceptions of what constitutes vegan food (meeting her personal preference for plant-based desserts that avoid the overpowering taste of coconut). She says she’s happy to bring in vegan customers and those who are not.
“The thing is, most people won’t eat a butter croissant because they want to taste the butter. They will eat it because it’s a higher quality item.”
Maison des Lys, 567 Great North Rd, Grey Lynn, and 403 Mount Eden Rd, Mount Eden. Maisondeslys.co.nz
Little Liberty Creamery
Little Liberty Creamery was founded by Taranaki-based Melissa and Chester Young in 2018, who started the business “out of necessity”. Their two children were born with various intolerances that meant they couldn’t enjoy many sweet treats.
Peita Kensington and former co-owner Rebecca Chubb, who bought Little Liberty Creamery from the couple together in 2022, became interested in plant-based ice cream for a similar reason.
“For me, it wasn’t because I was a vegan,” says Peita. “[Rebecca’s] daughter was struggling with lactose intolerance, and she approached me about buying Little Liberty when it came up for sale three years ago.”
Peita, who now helms the business herself in Taranaki, is proud to say the ice cream has convinced some of the staunchest skeptics (including aunts and uncles).
“I come from a dairy farming family. You get a dairy farmer come in and they go ‘Oh no, I don’t want to try it.’ And then they try it and they’re like ‘Oh, that’s not what I thought it would be.”
The plant-based confections at Little Liberty Creamery are each made from a mix of cashew and coconut milks. The ice cream is made from scratch, down to the raw cashews.
“We obviously know cashews and coconut are always going to be in it. But then from there, it’s like, ‘Okay, what are, what are we actually making?‘”
Each recipe has a long process of development, going beyond the simple addition of mix-ins to examine all the different ways they might enhance the intended flavour. Peita says the most coveted pint is mint chocolate chunk, closely followed by peanut butter cluster (for those interested, hazelnut chocolate and almond mocha are a close second and third).
Development of new recipes often comes from people close to the business – customers or family provide plenty of good ideas.
“My nana was the one who suggested the maple walnut, her favourite kind of ice cream. It’s just gone gangbusters this summer.”
On March 31, Peita marked an exciting milestone for the creamery. Pints of their most popular flavours are now available in supermarkets across Aotearoa. During this expansion, she is sure the plant-based and sensitive approach to intolerances will remain at the centre of Little Liberty Creamery’s approach. Some impactful moments make this important to her.
“What makes my job the best in the world is that I get a little kid who comes in and they’ve been lactose intolerant since the day they were born. They’ve never actually tried ice cream, but they’ve seen their brothers and sisters go to the ice cream shop.
“They can pick anything that they want that’s in the scoop freezer ... just seeing their face light up and they’re just like ‘Are you serious?’ It’s truly special.”
Little Liberty Creamery, 42 Matai St, Inglewood, Taranaki. Littlelibertycreamery.com
Madeleine Crutchley is a journalist for Viva and lifestyle and entertainment at The New Zealand Herald. She covers stories relating to fashion, arts, culture and food and drink, from her hometown of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. Recently, she’s written about underground fashion week Te Wiki Āhua O Aotearoa, real fruit ice cream and places to eat on Karangahape Rd.
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