Food Activism: VegFund and Vegan Bake Sale

Hey there, you lovely, compassionate vegheads. If you're looking for a positive, fun, yummy way to get active for animals and encourage compassionate, animal-friendly eating, I have two great tips. The upcoming Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale and new nonprofit VegFund.org provide wonderful opportunities and ideas (and funding!) for spreading the vegan love. Continue after the jump for a brief introduction (and links) to both.

1. Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale

If there's anything the vegan blogosphere knows and loves, it's vegan baking. And now you can use all those great recipes available on vegan blogs and in vegan cookbooks to participate in something really fantastic.

The folks behind Compassion for Animals, a new D.C.-based group, are bringing us the Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale between June 20 and June 28. The idea is for as many groups as possible to pick a venue and hold a bake sale sometime (or multiple times) within the designated week, as a way to introduce newbies to great vegan food, spread the animal-friendly word, and raise money for helping animals. Naturally, to participate, you need to sell only vegan items (i.e., no dairy, no eggs, no gelatin, etc.)--and there can be no distribution of materials that advocate harm to (including the eating of) animals, of course.

The organizers explain,

You don't have to be a vegan group or even an animal group to participate. We're inviting school clubs, Girl Scout troops, church/temple/mosque organizations, even bunches of friends who want to join.

It's an easy and enjoyable way to raise funds, and to raise awareness about food that is delicious and satisfying but does not involve exploiting or mass-killing animals. (Note that animals are slaughtered in huge numbers, and at all ages starting at newborn, in the dairy and egg industries). In addition, many people are allergic to dairy or eggs, and holding a vegan bake sale shows that you can make super-tasty versions of cakes, pies, cookies, and other desserts without these ingredients. [Note: Because of people's allergies, I'd recommend having one or two gluten-free and/or soy-free vegan options for your customers as well. -SE]

Find many more details and tips--both for the bake sale planning and for the actual baking--at the Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale site. The week for the event may still be a couple months away, but if you want to participate, you need to start planning ASAP, so check out the site.

2. VegFund.org

Say you want to show people how great vegan food can be--how eating can be so much more enjoyable without the abuse, exploitation, and killing of our fellow animals--but your financial resources for providing that food are limited. Enter the new nonprofit VegFund, filling an important, very helpful space. From the "What We Do" section of the site:

• Provide funding for the food, serving supplies, educational literature and any table/booth fees for serving vegan food (preferably at non-veg events or to an audience that is not familiar with vegan food or philosophy).
• Provide recipes & educational literature ideas and a food table sign for printing.
• Send ONE check to ONE person or group for the approved grant after we receive receipts.

In other words, if there's an event in your city where you can reach lots of people--music festivals, art festivals, cultural celebrations, farmers markets, green-living fairs--and you're willing to do the legwork, VegFund can provide practical advice as well as financial support. Visit the nonprofit's Web site for more information and an application.

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Photo: Vegan lemon cream cheese cupcakes, photo by Flickr user Aaron Landry