Vegan desserts are often difficult to come by in Sri Lanka, with a few home bakers who have taken on the daunting task of creating goodies that are healthy and guilt-free. Similarly, Melissa Dharmadasa of Bakes by Bella and Chantel of Coco Ceylon have paired up to create LAB by Coco.Bella – a vegan, and guilt-free range of desserts and goodies, in order to cater to vegans and health conscious people. This week, Melissa spoke to the Food Factor about the new venture, and what LAB by Coco.Bella is all about.

How did you and Chantel pair up to create LAB by Coco.Bella?

Chantel had her first stall at the second edition of the Colombo Design Market this year, and it was after that that we decided to meet up and talk things out, perhaps scope out the possibilities of combining both businesses together. We discussed it, and the first thing we thought of doing was a dessert and juice pairing for Mother’s Day this year. Funnily, we never imagined it would be a hit or even a combination that would remotely work but we were wrong. The Bella’s Red Velvet jars along with the Summer Bliss juice worked so well, because of the tanginess in the cream cheese and the passion fruit in the juice. So we thought this could work, and we are very compatible as a team, so I’d say that was the start.

Chantel’s very much into health food, and she’s very conscious about the products she uses to create her line of juices, smoothies and puddings so we thought of a possibility of a vegan range because doing desserts myself, I get so many requests for vegan goodies. LAB was actually Chantel’s idea for a name because she came up with the whole concept of a syringe to insert fillings and syrups into the doughnuts so it seemed like we were creating things inside a lab, and that’s the sort of feel we were going for.

Currently, what does the range consist of?

Doughnuts were our first creation, and they’re gluten-free and dairy-free, and it’s as healthy as it could get. They’re not fried, but baked. Even the glaze we put on the doughnuts is vegan so you can be assured that there’s no dairy in it. A regular doughnut has 18gms of fat whereas our doughnut has just 4gms of fat. The doughnuts consist of vanilla glazed, strawberry glazed, chocolate glazed, with sprinkles, and you can even add fruit to the doughnuts if the customer wants. We also do doughnuts holes with cinnamon. Currently, we are working on a few more desserts to be added to the range, and we want to do parfaits as well.

How do you ensure that the fillings and glazes for the doughnuts are free of dairy and gluten, especially with chocolate?

A lot of our ingredients are imported, because it’s very difficult to find vegan ingredients for baking in Sri Lanka. We do use Nutella for the doughnuts and even though our base is vegan, we want to give our customers the choice of being able to choose the fillings and glaze they want, so it could be a bit of both healthy and indulgent. It’s entirely customizable.

How has the response been so far?

It’s actually been pretty good. I had a Bakes by Bella stall a little over a week back at an event, and I had a lot of people asking me if I was also having LAB products at the stall, and I had to say no.

How early would customers need to make an order, and is there a minimum number for an order?

Three days notice prior to pickup would be ideal, and the minimum order would be a box of 4 doughnuts.

What’s in the pipeline for LAB by Coco.Bella?

We are actually planning to open a store pretty soon which will have this range of vegan desserts in addition to Bakes by Bella desserts and the healthy range of juices, smoothies and chia puddings by Coco Ceylon. We will be starting on the interior soon so hopefully, the store should be up and running by September.

LAB by Coco.Bella can be contacted on 0777445449 and 0778800434. To stay updated, do check out the page on Instagram (www.instagram.com/lab.bycocobella).

By Sarah Kellapatha
Photographs courtesy LAB by Coco.Bella