A Day at The Veganmania in Vienna

Last Friday I attended a special festival I always wanted to. It’s been on my list for so long but every time it took place I didn’t have time to actually go there.

Fortunately, this time it finally worked out and I made my way to Europe’s biggest vegan festival: The Veganmania in Vienna!

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What is The Veganmania Exactly?

As already said, Veganmania is Europe’s largest vegan festival organized by Vegane Gesellschaft Österreichs. Every year, the festival takes place in Vienna, Innsbruck and Graz.

Even though the main focus is on vegan food, there are tons of other stalls selling products such as vegan and fairly produced clothes, natural cosmetics, cookbooks, and many more.

Besides regional and Austrian vendors, people from all over Europe come to Veganmania and want to show their stuff. There are also people from organizations like Greenpeace or Anonymous for the Voiceless.

More than 30,000 visitors come and enjoy the relaxing atmosphere, delicious food, and great live music in Vienna every year. Luckily, I was part of it this time and I’m going to show you what I did and saw at Europe’s biggest vegan festival!

My First Time at The Veganmania in Vienna

This year, the Veganmania in Vienna took place from June 7 to June 10. Four days of vegan food paradise, sounds incredible right?

Unfortunately, I live a little bit far away from Vienna and I didn’t have enough time to spend a weekend there. Thus I had only one day at the festival, which was still enough to fill my stomach with all the tasty food offered there.

When I arrived at the festival a bit before the official start, quite many people were there already. I was a little bit overwhelmed at the beginning and had no idea where to go first.

Neither did I know what to try, see or eat because there was so much choice! Filled with excitement I decided to visit every stall one after another.

Information Stalls at The Mariahilfer Straße

Right next to the Mariahilfer Straße were people from organizations such as:

• Animal Friends Croatia
• Anonymous for the Voiceless
• Greenpeace
• Rinderwahnsinn.at
• Sea Shepherd Austria

There I got some information about what exactly those organizations are doing. Moreover, they sold pieces of clothes, buttons, bags, and other stuff.

First Time Trying Vegan Cheese

After visiting those first couple of stalls, I continued exploring more of Veganmania. I saw a long queue in front of a certain stand and got really curious.

On my way there, I passed people selling natural cosmetics, handmade vegan bags & shoes, different kinds of nut butter and dates. I need to admit that I made a little stop and tried some dates – I’m literally obsessed and can’t get enough of them!

Afterward, I finally reached the place where all those people were lining up and saw what those people were selling. It was vegan cheese!

Although I’ve been vegan for over a year now, I’d never tried vegan cheese before. Guess how excited I was, especially because I was able to try more than five different sorts of cheese.

Most of them were made out of cashew nuts with coconut oil and some really tasted like cheese!

All of them were made and sold by the polish company Serotonina and the price was around €10 for one piece of cheese.

Vegan Chocolate Tasting

After munching enough vegan cheese, I got some really bad cravings for something sweet. Luckily, there was a stall from Coco Caravan selling handcrafted chocolate close by.

All the chocolate bars there were raw and only sweetened with coconut blossom nectar.

They had some really exotic flavors such as Chai Dark Chocolate or Tamari Almond Chocolate and one of these bars cost around €5. A true paradise for chocolate lovers like me!

Having Indian And Austrian Food Together at The Veganmania

After snacking a little bit, I got really hungry and went to the place with all the main food stands.

I simply couldn’t decide what to have for lunch so I tried buying as many small dishes as possible instead of one big meal. Still, it was so difficult to choose as all the food stands offered mouthwatering dishes such as:

• Jackfruit Burger
• Falafel
• Vegan Kebab
• Vegan Pizza
• Indian Samosa
• Vegan Kärntner Nudeln (Austrian dish)
• African Sambusa
• Sweet Potato Fries

… and many more!
In the end, I went for Indian Samosa and Austrian Kärnter Nudeln, just because I’d never tried both in the vegan version before.

I can tell you, both were absolutely amazing!

Dessert Anyone?

The variety of savory dishes was overwhelming, but the number of sweets offered was even better. From Nutella pizza to vegan chimney cake, raw chocolate cakes, donuts, and ice cream – there was something for everyone.

I tried chimney cake in Budapest a few years ago and totally fell in love with that sweet dish. No wonder I simply had to get myself one at the Veganmania!

After finishing the chimney cake, I was craving some ice cream since it was a very warm and beautiful summer day. Good for me that one of my absolute favorite ice cream shops in Vienna, Veganista, had an ice cream stand at the Veganmania.

I picked their so-called “Muffin” flavor that tasted like a blueberry muffin and had some dough pieces in it.

Now you probably think that I ate enough already. Well, you’re right. I really had enough food eaten and felt like I was rather rolling than walking! 😀
Thus I decided to leave the food stands for a while and focus on other things.

Coconut Bowls, Vegan Shoes, And Natural Cosmetic

There’s no doubt that more than 80% of all stalls at Veganmania had something to do with food. But let’s be honest, that was also the main reason I went there. 😉

However, as already mentioned at the beginning of this blog post, there were many other types of stands.

For example, the company Balu Bowls was represented. They sold sustainable, handcrafted coconut bowls and I bought one for myself.

There were other vendors selling handmade natural cosmetics like shampoo bars, face cleansers, and shower gels.

Moreover, I saw two or three stalls selling vegan and fairly produced shoes that looked really nice!

Veganmania in August

Unfortunately, I had only one day where I was able to attend the Veganmania in Vienna. Luckily, there’s a second Veganmania summer festival in Vienna that takes place at the end of August.

I can guarantee you I will definitely go there as I don’t want to miss the chance to stuff myself with the best food at Europe’s biggest vegan festival again!

Maybe I’ll see some of you there? 🙂

Also if you travel around Austria a bit, you’ll find tons of plant-based restaurants in the major cities. Have a look at a guide to Salzburg vegan restaurants to find delicious options in the birth city of Mozart!

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