hi! I’m Allyson Kramer, and I love good food.

My educational background is in fine art but my true passion is creating beautiful and delicious recipes. I’ve technically been interested in the trade since I was just a wee little one. My mother was a wonderful cook, and she had many generations of people to teach her about culinary delights, and luckily I picked up a lot of good stuff from the get go. Cooking and eating have always been a big part of my world.

At a young age I shunned what many would consider age appropriate interests, and instead gravitated towards watching reruns of The French Chef with Julia Child, scouring cookbooks such as The Joy of Cooking in lieu of Judy Blume novels, and baking up a storm while my mother was away earning a degree in Psychology. Eventually, as a teenager, I supplemented my classic cookbook collection with vegetarian cookbooks and guides, and little did I know I was on my way to pursuing my dream. After reading those books, I became enthralled with vegan cooking. At home as a teenager, with my newly announced vegan interests, I was forced to cook my own meals, which was just fine by me.

In college I studied painting and sculpture, and much of my work focused on domesticity, food, and society’s responses to it. In between painting and sculpture I still poured over my cookbook collection and began diving headfirst into recipe development on my own. Over the years I was an on-and-off-again vegan (mostly due to the idea of staying “cool” due to my insecurities as a young adult), but I never lost the interest in cooking plant based meals.

After graduation, I pursued what I thought was my dream job in the arts, and I realized (fast) that it was not where I wanted to be. Although extremely motivated, I simply was not satisfied; I’d rather have been baking cookies and making paintings about them. I was doing it anyways, so I thought I’d try my hand at it full-time. I gave up my career path in the arts and took the knowledge I had gained from art school and applied it to starting a food blog. I aimed to create a site that not only taught and inspired people to create great food, but also how to do it in an unconventional way. And here I am. I hope to not be going anywhere for a very long time because I adore my job, and I love sharing my culinary “art” with the world.

One thing you may notice about my recipes on this site is that they are all vegan and gluten-free. While this double diet may seem restricting, I encourage you to peruse my archives and see for yourself that this unconventional way of eating is anything but deprived. Also, even though I develop vegan and gluten-free recipes doesn’t mean I’m a “health food” recipe developer. Sometimes my recipes end up pretty darn healthy, as I love to focus on whole, plant based foods as the base for many of them, but other times you’ll see a nice big dose of fat and sugar included within the ingredient lists. Unapologetically.

 

FAQ

I get a lot of emails and many of them ask similar questions, so I created this FAQ section in hopes that some of you find it helpful.

 

I’m not gluten free… can I replace all of the Gluten Free flours you use in your recipes with regular All Purpose wheat flour?

As much as I’d like to say “yes!”, I simply cannot guarantee that replacing all the listed GF flours with another type of flour will work. It may; however, since I have developed these recipes specifically to be gluten free and vegan–and haven’t tested them with regular flour–I honestly have no way to say how the taste/texture may turn out.

 

Where do your recipes come from? Are they all your own?

Yes, all of the recipes I feature on my website are my own, unless noted, of course. I have been developing recipes for many many years, and have a wealth of cooking and especially baking experience under my belt. Beginning when I was just a kid, I read every cookbook I could get my hands on like a novel and was taught by my mother and other family members to make a slew of traditional recipes and cooking/baking techniques. I’ve been doing it all my life, and I love every single minute of it. Instead of using or borrowing others’ inventions, I prefer to come up with my own recipes for the foods I am craving. So, essentially this blog features my own creations- with a hefty dose of inspiration from the countless talented people in the culinary sphere making this world a tastier place.

 

Why are you giving out your recipes for free? What are you getting out of this?

In short, I am doing this to add to the growing number of resources for eating and cooking vegan (and gluten free!). I have heard the line “what do you eat as a vegan?” too. many. times. Add “gluten free” to that question and heads start to explode.  This site is a consistently growing answer to that.

I also think the more knowledge and info about plant based eating that is spread around free of charge, the better for everyone.

 

Can I re-post your recipes on my website? I made your cake and it turned out amazing, and I would love to share the experience!

If you made one of my recipes, and loved it… thank you so much! I really, really enjoy when fellow bloggers/websites link to my recipes and photographs. So, with that said, if you would like to feature one of my recipes or photos on your own website or blog, I would appreciate you giving credit where it’s due and PLEASE don’t pretend it’s your own. That makes me sad.

Link backs instead of direct copying of my stuff are always very much appreciated. Direct copying and stealing of my content is never appreciated.