When Becca Medvin went vegan at the age of 14, she had no trouble giving up meat. Or milk or cheese or eggs. What she missed was dessert.

``I have the biggest sweet tooth of anyone I know,'' says Medvin, now 16. ``I need dessert every day.''

Fresh fruit is lovely, but a girl's got to have her chocolate chip cookies. Alas, the vegan treats Medvin found ``weren't as good as normal desserts.''

They were flavor-challenged. They had texture issues. She took to the kitchen to create her own.

A junior at Ransom Everglades School who dreams of having her own bakery some day, Medvin came up with what people tell her is ``the best cupcake they've ever had, vegan or non.''

Don't take her word for it. Becca's Vegan Cupcakes are at outlets including the Bookstore in the Grove, where they sell briskly for $1.75 a pop.

``You don't need eggs and butter and all that to make something as good as it can be,'' says Medvin, who lives in Coconut Grove. ``And it's fun.''

Gaby Larrea, co-owner of Peace A' Cake, agrees.

``Being vegetarian doesn't mean you're eating grass all day,'' he says. ``Eating healthy can be decadent and yummy'' -- like Peace A' Cake's signature chocolate chip walnut cake.

Since February, Larrea and his business partner, Veronica Menin, have been selling vegan cakes, muffins and cookies privately and to vegetarian eateries including Beehive and Om Garden.

``Vegan baking gave us a way to be healthy and still eat dessert,'' Larrea says.

Neither Medvin nor the Peace A' Cake pair claim their to-die-for desserts beat out broccoli when it comes to nutrition. Nor are they low in calories and fat. Peace A' Cake's two dozen treats range from 120 to 270 calories per serving.

The vegan bonus comes from replacing eggs, milk, butter and even white sugar with products like coconut oil, which adds richness and fat but no cholesterol, and agave nectar, which adds sweetness but is low-glycemic and doesn't make your blood sugar spike.

At the vaunted New York bakery BabyCakes NYC, Erin McKenna's bag of tricks also includes products like xanthan gum, a thickening stabilizer, and high-protein garbanzo-fava flour. They sound unlikely to produce anything you'd want to eat but figure in almost every knockout BabyCakes dessert, including Triple-Chocolate Fat Pants Cake.

Among BabyCakes' vegan and nonvegan fans are Natalie Portman, Jason Schwartzman, Zooey Deschanel . . . and Medvin, who has twice made the pilgrimage.

``I went there and I loved it. I just bought the BabyCakes cookbook, and oh, my God, it's one of my favorites.''

Reproducing BabyCakes' treats requires a trip to the natural-foods store and a serious investment. The ingredients for McKenna's chocolate chip cookies, for example, price out at a gasp-worthy $30.

At Peace A' Cake, ``our ingredients are expensive,'' says Menin, who charges $30 for a 10-inch cake or a dozen muffins. ``But it's impossible to make the food any cheaper.''

David Kalas, pastry chef at the Fort Lauderdale vegan mecca, Sublime, uses raw agave nectar in greatest hits like his Chocolate Nirvana, but wants to make vegan treats accessible and affordable for home cooks. That's why the scone recipe he demonstrated at a recent Vegan Baking 101 class uses sugar.

``That's OK if you do it in moderation,'' he says.

Ah, well. As Kalas can tell her, the path to vegan baking is not a straight one. He studied at the Cordon Bleu in Sydney, Australia, and made a detour to Yale University for a master's degree in theology before joining Sublime last year.

Kalas doesn't want to be too woo-woo about it, but he acknowledges that ``the spiritual aspect does impact my baking tremendously. You want to prepare food as a loving offering.''

Creating vegan desserts, he says, ``is about baking with compassion.''

Peace A' Cake's Larrea went vegan for health. Medvin did it ``for health, the environment, everything.''

Whatever their reasons, ``We have the same goal, says Menin -- ``opening the ways of the world and showing people they can live a healthy life and eat yummy foods.''

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