The Flying Duck is easy to miss. Coming from Edinburgh on Saturday 4th April, I knew that it was close to Buchanan Street Bus Station, but hadn’t appreciated quite how close. It was a sunny day in Glasgow, which made it slightly incongruous to be descending the steps into a nightclub located up an alley off Renfield Street. But descend them I did and was welcomed into the friendly, chaotic world of the Vegan Fete. The darkness, crowds and pulsing music soon made me forget it was daylight outside and I took to perusing the stalls of, let’s face it, mainly cake. Not that I’m complaining! Quite the opposite.

The Hunt Sabs and The Vegan Kind were there amongst other familiar faces (if I haven’t mentioned you it’s because I didn’t see you – it was quite dark and my eyesight isn’t what it was!) but the cakes were the items that seemed to produce the biggest queues.

Smashing Tarts, for it was they, had the biggest one when I was there, and no wonder with that fabulous array of super-indulgent wares. As well as Daiya cheese twists they had Bourbon cake and tiffin, ganache cake and coconut cake and countless other delights. I made a few purchases… I’d been invited on twitter to try out Dairy Free Tablet’s Mint choc offerings and oh goodness, it was good. I may have eaten almost a whole bar on the bus home, but don’t tell anyone.

 

Considerit chocolate were also exhibiting, they of vegan cream egg fame, and I sampled some of their Amaretto truffle bar, leading me to buy not only that but also the orange flavour and the coffee and muscovado flavour.

I needed a distraction from all this sugar and so wandered over to Kirsten Scott’s table of delightful jewellery and clay crafts. Many of the earrings were animal themed and I fell for a gorgeous fox design. There were food themes too, with bracelets made from tiny slices of Battenberg cake and Swiss rolls amongst others.

All in all it was a lovely fete, and although a bit warm and crowded, I was glad to see such an event have an obviously big following.
This is the first big vegan fair in Scotland this year, with Vegan Festival in Edinburgh in August and then the big one, a two day Vegfest in Glasgow in December. Vegan festival is in Newcastle as well, in July, and having attended last year I can say it was a great place to be.

These events are growing more and more popular and taking place in more places throughout the country, so whether you’re in Liverpool, London, Brighton, Bristol or Birmingham, or indeed anywhere else in the UK, there should hopefully be a vegan festival near you soon. Have fun!