North East Vegan Festival | Sunderland

On Sunday I headed to the Stadium of Light in Sunderland for the North East Vegan Festival, also known as NEVFEST. I’ve only been vegan for a month or so, and although I have found alternatives for a lot of products already whilst I was vegetarian, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to source those I’m still left to find and to try new foods. I brought my mum along with me as she isn’t vegan or even vegetarian, just to try and broaden her mind and to show her that being vegan doesn't mean I can only eat plants; I can in fact eat exactly the same foods as everyone else, but better because they come without harming any animals.

We made our way to the first floor of the festival which was full of mainly food stalls, yum. The first stall we came to was run by a company called Koko who were selling and offering samples of coconut milk, a dairy free and soya free alternative to milk. I've tried products from this company before, in particular the chocolate milk, and was impressed so it was a no brainer that I would pay them a visit. My mum tried a sample of the chocolate milk and said she enjoyed it and I picked up a pack of 3 strawberry milks as I hadn't tried them before.

Next up we have Sgaia, UK's vegan butcher shop. I'll be honest and just say I was blown away with how much like a butcher shop the stall looked and also by the choice of different meats on offer. I tried a sample of the smoked steak and I loved the taste but hated the texture, it's scarily on par with actual beef. I wish I'd picked up some of the bacon rashers to try but I'm almost certain this won't be the last time I'll see Sgaia so I definitely will next time.

Next door to Sgaia's stall was a coffee company called Beanies (correct me if I'm wrong but all the coffee was by that brand so I'm assuming that's right). I was drawn in basically by all of the different coffee bean flavours and then my mum noticed there was different flavoured instant coffees too. After a sniff of a few different ones we settled on Amaretto Almond flavour, sounds delicious doesn't it? I'm yet to try it but my mum has swooped in and had a cup and said it was delicious.

I was really glad to see Tyne Chease had a stall. I saw their cheese in Farplace Animal Rescue's vegan shop a couple of weeks ago but wasn't sure what flavours I'd enjoy so here was my chance to find out. I was always fond of smoked cheese like Applewood so I gave their smoked cheese a try. It was honestly really nice, a completely different texture to the cheese I'm currently using and I could taste the cashews in the after taste. I don't think I'd use this as an every day cheese though, at £7.95 per wheel it is a bit pricey but due to the work that goes in to it and the quality of the product I totally understand why. I'll definitely be picking up a few flavours for the Christmas cheese board this year!

I'm not really a chocolate lover but when we came across Essy & Bella's stall I had to stop and stare at how beautiful all the bars looked. All of the flavours sounded delicious. I circled round and came back to this stall 3 times because I kept pondering on whether I should buy the honeycomb chocolate bar and in the end I didn't buy it and I regret it so much. It's nice to see so many flavours of chocolate that are vegan, it makes me very happy to see there's a variety of simple and complex flavours.

I didn't catch the name of this stall but my mum was thrilled when we got to it because she loves all things cake. She stood for about 5 minutes trying to decide what to buy and in the end she went for a slice of Banana bread, and a Blueberry Muffin.

I really liked the look of the products Bohemian Chic Minerals brought along. Every item, especially the lipsticks, looked high end and sleek and there was a vast amount of shades available in shadows, lipsticks and lip glosses. A lot of the lipstick shades look like perfect dupes of lipsticks I used to wear that weren't cruelty free which is ideal. A lot of work has gone in to these cosmetics and it definitely shows.

This stall was an absolute treat on the eyes. My mum was even more delighted to see Farplace's cake stall and was once again torn on which ones to pick. After much pondering she settled on a cream slice and a viennese swirl. I'm not really a fan of cakes and the like but I tried the viennese swirl when we got home and it was lush. I'm talking like if you gave that to someone and didn't tell them it was vegan they wouldn't know either way.

Try and tell me these pies don't look yummy, go on just try (if you do you're wrong). I wanted to get a samosa and a pie so bad but by this point I'd already eaten two hotdogs so I was pushing my luck if I thought I could then eat two pastries and not be bloated. I need to find a recipe for both of these because they sound amazing, right up my street. Another feast for the eyes. 

Funny story, we were actually 5 stalls up from the LUSH stall and I hadn't spotted it yet I'd smelled it and turned to my mum sniffed up and said "LUSH are here, LUSH are definitely here I can smell them". My lushie senses were right to tingle because I found them, hooray! Lush is my favourite shop ever and I'll always support them and the causes they support. It's so nice to have such a mainstream store who's products are all either vegan or vegetarian they're changing the world of cosmetics for the better. I wanted to buy everything from their stall but I instead opted for two Lava Lamp bath bombs. They've just been reformulated and I am delighted because when I visited Oxford Street for the first time about a year ago they'd gotten rid to start the process. Sunday was a happy day.

After we'd walked around all the food stalls we decided to walk around the crafts upstairs. After that we then decided to walk the food again and we spotted Thistly Cross cider. Myself and my mum both tried a sample of the Elderflower flavour and also of the Strawberry flavour. They both tasted really nice and the strawberry one tastes just like Kopparberg (which as far as I'm aware isn't vegan)! So of course I purchased a bottle of each flavour I tried, I mean who'd turn down a vegan version of Kopparberg?!

The last stall I've pictured is Unless who were serving cheesecake, donuts, steak skewers, and fritz kola. I went back here because I spotted the cheesecake at the start of my day and it looked amazing so was obviously playing on my mind. I haven't eaten cheesecake in 8 months so it was a relief to see a vegan version. It was so aesthetically pleasing to look at and it tasted pretty good too! I picked peanut butter cup flavour and it was honestly the best cheesecake I've ever eaten, and it was a massive slice as well none of this tiny slither malarky it was what I like to call, a real piece.

There are a few stalls I enjoyed just as much as those mentioned here that I haven't photographed due to it being busy at the time I was there. A few of these are; Dickies Nuts (tried the peri peri cashews they were A*), Missy's Vegan Cupcakes (amazing quality cakes and each one looked yummy), and Considerit Chocolate (a vegan hotel chocolate). The hotdog stall was I'm sure cooking Vegusto hotdogs if anyone wants to try them. I also popped over to a sweet stall and picked up a Mahalo (bounty but better cos of the almonds), Cleo's peanut butter cups, and lastly Goody Good Stuff cherries as I've searched all over for them for about 6 months so was thrilled to finally get some.

Our little haul!

I had a really good day at my first NEVFEST and as far as I know my mum enjoyed it too. She told me she was amazed at the food and couldn't believe it was all vegan so I think her eyes have been opened a little. I wanted to go and watch a couple of documentaries but I've cried my eyes out at every one I've watched so far (I'll make another post about that soon in case any of you are interested, lots on netflix) and I didn't wanna cry in a room full of strangers. I really want to return in July and I'm so close to buying a VIP ticket as I had so much fun and I'd love my boyfriend to experience it and the food with me.

If any of you missed this event and are interested in NEVFEST don't fret as there's another event on July 10th at the Metro Radio Arena in Newcastle. Standard tickets are £2.50 and you can find all information about the event here.