Northern Vegan Festival

Today was the second Northern Vegan Festival.

Last year, I think the organisers seriously underestimated how much interest there would be- the place was packed out, and if you didn't go early (like us) there wasn't much left.

This year they had learnt from their mistakes and had hired out the Empress Ballroom in Winter Gardens, Blackpool.

I'd arranged to meet with a friend, and fellow vegan blogger, Flash Gordonette and a couple of others and after wandering around a craft market that was being held in the same building we queued up and headed in.

On entry, as some of the first people in we picked up a few freebies- LABL magazines issues 1-4 and a choice of Love Beets juices- Super Tasty Beetroot and Beetroot and Cherry. No one was fond of the beetroot juice, however Flash, who hates wasting food downed three of them in one go, which she regretted afterwards! As for the magazines, they're not my kind of thing, they only have two pages of recipes and only one of the magazines actually has any that I would consider making.

After walking around the entrance area, scoffing any free samples we could get our hands on, we moved into the main ballroom, which was rather impressive and a lot more roomy compared to last year:

First stop was a stall selling vegan cookbooks, I have tons of cook books but not too many vegan ones, so when I spotted Vegan Eats World at a discounted price I grabbed it, however I regretted it later after realising just how heavy it is.  I'm looking forward to having a proper look through and giving some of the recipes a go.

After sussing out the main section, we headed for some lunch in the separate dining area.  I'd heard on the grapevine that The Vegan Grindhouse would be there, so I made a beeline for their stall.

I went for the bacon cheeseburger, with added vegan mayo and BBQ sauce. I'm pretty sure the cheese is Violife, which is one of the few vegan cheeses I actually like. The burger itself had a lovely smokey flavour.

After food, we headed back to the main area to make our final purchases. Lakeside Ethical Treats were there selling Go Max Go bars, I went for their Jokerz bar.

These are suppose to be a vegan version of snickers, and as someone who was a big snickers fan before going vegan I would say that they come pretty close. However at £2 a bar (and it's not like they are anywhere near the size of a Vego bar) it's definitely a one off treat.

Apart from the small pack of Goody Good Sweets I won on a tombola, I didn't actually buy any more food items. However I still came away penniless because I spotted these cute cat earrings at Bough To Beauty, and despite knowing I have a slight reaction to non-sterling silver earrings if I wear them too long I just couldn't resist.

I also won a Vegusto hamper from one of the stalls but they rang me when I was on the train on the way home and I had to collect if from the festival itself and they refused to post it out. That was a bit of a bummer, even if I was only after the No Moo Melty and mushroom burger.

The festival was a lot better this year, however now that they have a bigger venue it would benefit from a couple of more stalls, here's to hoping it continues to grow.