ABOUT CVK
Hi! I’m Carol, the recipe creator, photographer, and writer behind Carol’s Vegan Kitchen. I’ve spent the past 7 years immersing myself in the vegan lifestyle and sharing everything surrounding vegan food. I’m passionate about my mission to Feed People Plants and feel what we eat is one of the most powerful choices we can make!
Welcome to my kitchen dear friend. I’m beyond excited we’re on this journey together!
A LITTLE BIT ABOUT ME
Location:
Port Angeles, WA on the scenic Olympic Peninsula
Education:
B.A. in Art with a minor in Art History, Seattle University 1993, Summa Cum Laude
Why did you go vegan?
When my daughter, Elizabeth, became vegan in college, I wanted her to have delicious meals when she came home for the holidays. After cooking my way through several vegan cookbooks and doing a ton of research, I knew I never wanted to live any other way!
What work did you do before blogging?
Art instructor at The Children’s Montessori School where all 4 of my children attended.
Running event director. I still love event planning and host monthly culinary workshops!
Co-owner of Athlete’s Choice, the clothing and shoe retail store my husband started in 1986.
Do you have a cookbook?
Yessss! My e-cookbook called Carol’s Vegan Holiday is an outstanding collection of treasured family favorite recipes and vegan versions of holiday classics.
A LITTLE BIT MORE
Hobbies: (Outside of food and photography)
Endurance exercise- If I’m not making a mess in my kitchen, you can find me biking on the Olympic Discovery Trail, swimming at our local pool or in Lake Crescent, and hiking in the *gorgeous* Olympic National Park.
Traveling- I’m a homebody at heart but love to explore other cultures, their food, and lifestyle. It’s also a wonderful excuse to visit my kids who have lived all over the world!
Reading -which I couldn’t sit still for as a kid but now thoroughly enjoy.
Likes:
Natural light- I appreciate its beauty more than ever living in the most northwest corner of the US where the days are very short through the winter months.
Chocolate- is my kryptonite in all forms but especially cacao tea.
Family- My husband Todd, and our 4 grown children, Ashley, Bobby, Elizabeth, and Janelle, are what I care about most in this world.
Dislikes:
Clutter- Yes, I’m on the Marie Kondo train.
TV- It’s the first thing I turn off when entering a hotel room. Although movies are my jam!
Wasting food- Scraping the bowl clean and subscribing to a compost service makes me happy all over.
Do I have to be vegan to enjoy the recipes?
Nope! My family members who are both vegan and meat, dairy, and egg eaters, are my #1 taste testers. I only share a recipe with their stamp of approval. In addition, my omnivore private chef clients and culinary students try all these recipes. Everything you see here is 100% created to satisfy all eaters around your table. Delicious food comes from good quality seasonal ingredients whether you’re vegan, a meat-lover, or anywhere in between!
What will I find here?
At Carol’s Vegan Kitchen, you can expect to find a full range of mouthwatering vegan recipes from energizing breakfasts, satisfying salads, lunch and dinner ideas, to indulgent and secretly healthy vegan desserts.
I want you to feel like I’m right at your elbow guiding you every step of the way. And while I can’t be in your kitchen, I provide easy-to-follow recipes with step-by-step photos so you can dive into vegan cooking with confidence.
GET TO KNOW ME BETTER
The Joy of Cooking was my kitchen bible
As a young food enthusiast, I learned how to use what I had on hand to make food taste yummy, making countless comical mistakes along the way. One time I ruined a perfectly good sheet pan trying to make “glue” out of sugar to build a gingerbread house. I still treasure my tattered copy of the Joy of Cooking where it all started.
I married young, while still in college, and started having kids right away
Back then we cooked on a tight budget and made everything from scratch for a family of 6. It felt like work. But when my youngest daughter was 16, she set her sights on culinary school. We spent countless hours in the kitchen cooking shoulder to shoulder. Cooking became fun again. It was art you could eat! Today she is a Culinary Institute of America graduate and an accomplished vegan chef.
I launched my website in 2020
In 2020, all my kids were through college, age 50 was just around the corner, and it was time for a change. At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, we were forced to close our retail store for 6 weeks. This gave me the nudge I needed to start my blog. Sharing recipes and meaningful content with folks outside my family was so rewarding and filled me with pride. I knew this was what I wanted to do from then on!
I grew up on a hobby farm in rural Redmond WA
This was the 70’s and 80’s folks. Kids were allowed to roam free! My parents were busy working and striving to maintain a sustainable lifestyle, so I often made our family dinners. We had a huge backyard garden for produce and ate our own livestock. Eating the flesh of my pet chickens and sheep always grossed me out and made me sad.
My photography
Even with a college degree in art, photography was a *huge* learning curve for me. I took an online photography course in 2020 and have been shooting weekly ever since. I work hard to further develop my skills by attending workshops all over the world and connecting with other creators. Seeing my work gradually improve fuels my passion for telling the story of food through beautiful images.
I’m proud to be featured multiple times on the covers and in the pages of Thrive Magazine, and Global Vegan Magazine, and many other online magazines as well!
My food philosophy
Food is precious and powerful. Each recipe has a story to tell. My focus is on fresh, locally sourced, seasonal ingredients. I strive to honor these life-giving ingredients by making wholesome, flavorful, wow-worthy recipes. Balance is important too and I prize desserts just as much as salads. I feel everyone deserves to eat really good food!
LOCAL PARTNERS
I looove working closely with small farms and businesses to promote a sustainable field-to-fork lifestyle. Much of the gorgeous produce you see in my photography was grown or foraged within 20 miles of my kitchen! I’m proud to be a Green Wheel Certified business and partnered with SisterLand Farms, Buena Luz Bakery, and Maple Street Kitchen.
If you’re curious what plant is in my logo, it’s stinging nettle. They grow everywhere here in our cool, rainy climate!
Thanks so much for being here! It means the world to me, and I value your visit. I hope you’ll consider joining my Carol’s Vegan Kitchen newsletter to receive tasty recipes and a FREE e-cookbook.
Oh, and don’t forget to follow me on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, and TikTok. Be sure to tag me (@carolsvegankitchen #carolsvegankitchen) I love to see what you’re cooking up!
X,o,
FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM
