Last year I was browsing for vegetarian festivals and the day I was searching online was the day of the Bethlehem Vegfest. My lifelong (okay the past two years or so) food truck crush The Cinnamon Snail was going to be there and I was so sad I missed it. As soon as I found out the date for the 2013 vegfest, I marked it on my calendar and declared I was going. (The Cinnamon Snail couldn’t make it this year because they were up for a vendy award the same day.) I was super excited to find out that it was 100% vegan this year too. Just an added bonus.

We had no issues getting there, but parking was kind of difficult. We actually passed a parking garage close by, and drove passed it, not knowing where we were going, and after driving around in traffic for another 25-30 minutes, we ended up back at the first garage (that was only a 5 minute walk). I only had a $5 and the machine didn’t give change, so we paid for parking from 12-8pm, which was way more than we needed, but no big deal.

I was delightfully surprised by the size of the event, I was really nervous we were going to drive an hour and a half only to walk around for 15 minutes and be bored. (The mr. willingly accompanied me, and he was a saint about it…he drove and barely complained about anything.)

There was a great selection of food vendors. There was pizza, Asian, burgers/dogs, and a lot of falafel. I was a little disappointed in the veggie burger/dog cart. There was one guy grilling packaged burgers/dogs one at a time, he also sold UTZ cheese curls (not vegan), didn’t have a fire extinguisher (there was a police officer who came around and checked while I was standing there), and someone in front of me had gotten a cold veggie dog and wanted his money back. I had already been standing in line for 20 minutes (he was seriously doing one at a time), and this was what the mr. wanted…I couldn’t drag him to a vegan festival and then not let him pick out his own food.

Waiting in line at the hot dog stand, then I wandered over there to get my lunch.

I ended up getting myself a falafel wrap from a stand next to the hot dog guy and even though it took a good 20-25 minutes it was delicious and huge.

Bad pic, but amazing falafel…my mouth is watering thinking about it.

There were a bunch of food vendors that were dedicated vegan companies and I wanted to try more of them, but the lines took so long. I was disappointed I didn’t get to check out v-lish soups, or the kombucha stand…I LOVE kombucha, but I had just grabbed a wine spritzer, and I pretty much nursed it while we walked around the rest of the day. Looking back, I missed a couple of other companies I wanted to check out and did the whole “I’ll see them when we come back” and totally forgot. I also learned that if you like and want to buy something…BUY IT…I missed a bunch of cute t-shirts because they ran out of the smaller sizes.

One of the companies I was most interested in checking out was Vegan Treats Bakery. I’ve been following them on twitter for quiet a while and they have the most beautiful desserts…turns out they are extremely tasty too. I’m actually kind of glad they are an hour and a half away because I think they would turn me into a dessert person.

I can’t tell you how excited I was to be somewhere that I could choose anything to eat without worrying what was in it. I actually hadn’t realized how restricted I feel, until I had the feeling of having options.

I want to thank the organizers and the volunteers who made this an awesome festival. I’ve never been to anything quite like it, and it was beyond what I was expecting. There was a large variety of food (and booze), kids activities, two music stages, and a lot of great organizations. I can’t believe some of the comments on the Facebook page about how it wasn’t green enough, there weren’t enough organic food vendors, etc…you’ll never please everyone and I am very grateful!

Walking around with alcohol reminded me of my Greece days.

I wanted to get the boston cream donut for the mr, but the girls (who cut) in front of me in line got the last one…so we settled with a chocolate donut and a cannoli.

And a pumpkin parfait

Merch: two tshirts (one adult, one kid), wrist band, pin, catnip cat toy, bumper sticker, and a bottle of red wine

Sunday breakfast…yum