Lore Salas: “I don’t want someone to think a dessert is good for being vegan. I want them to think it’s delicious”

For Lore Salas (Dates&Avocados, Barcelona), pastry can be plant-based, healthy, or adapted to specific needs, but above all, it has to taste good.

That’s why her work isn’t simply a “free-from” version of traditional pastry. It’s not just about removing gluten, dairy, eggs, or refined sugars, but about knowing the ingredients she works with very well and understanding what each one can contribute.

Below, we share an excerpt from the interview published in the Spanish-language pastry magazine DPAS, issue #523.

Plant-based, gluten-free, or healthy pastry is often discussed in terms of what it doesn’t contain. Do you find that way of explaining it problematic?

Yes and no. I understand that sometimes it needs to be said, because there are people who need to know if something doesn’t contain gluten, dairy, eggs, or refined sugar. It also helps to differentiate a way of working. But if you only focus on the “without,” it seems the question becomes: “So what does it have?” And for me, the important thing is precisely that: what it does have. Real ingredients, flavor, texture, pleasure. I don’t want someone to try a dessert thinking it’s good “for being vegan” or “for being gluten-free.” I want them to think it’s delicious.

You say you no longer work from direct substitution. How do you build a recipe now?

At first, I did think more about substitutions: this for this, the egg for this ingredient, the butter for another… But I haven’t worked like that for years. Now I start with a texture, a flavor, or a sensation. I think about what I want to achieve and how I can get there with my ingredients. I don’t look at a traditional recipe to translate it literally, but rather I try to build it from a different perspective. I know how flaxseed, aquafaba, nuts, plant-based drinks, fats, dates behave… And from there, I start looking for the right path.

There’s a phrase that perfectly sums up your approach: “Pastry is also food.” What does that mean to you?

That dessert shouldn’t be excluded from everything we demand of the rest of a meal. We can talk about seasonal, local, organic ingredients, or more conscious cooking throughout an entire menu, and then get to dessert and it seems like it doesn’t matter anymore. For me, that doesn’t make sense. Dessert is part of the gastronomic experience and it also enters the body. It has to be delicious, it has to give you pleasure, but it can also be good for you and made with ingredients that nourish you.

What excites you more: bringing sweets back to someone who hasn’t been able to eat them for a long time, or surprising someone who wasn’t looking for anything “free-from”?

Both things give me great satisfaction, but in different ways. When someone hasn’t been able to eat cheesecake, tiramisu, or a madeleine for years because of an intolerance or because they know it will upset their stomach, and suddenly they can enjoy it again, that really touches me. But I also love it when someone comes in not looking for anything special, tries something with a bit of skepticism, and is surprised. That’s when I feel the job is well done, because you haven’t convinced them with words, but with flavor. 

Discover these creations and the full interview we did with Lore Salas in our Spanish-language pastry magazine, DPAS #523.