Mad City Vegan Fest 2015

I attended Mad City Vegan Fest in Madison on Saturday, June 27th! It was a great event and it felt wonderful to be surrounded by like-minded people. 

The fest is in its fifth year and took place at the Goodman Community Center. Admission is free! 

Parking was free in the lot behind the community center, but it was full when I arrived around 11:15. I found street parking nearby quite easily, just like fest organizers promised on their website and social media.

I started out by walking around the gym, which featured vendor booths and the food court.

I stood in a very long line in the gym to get a small swag bag to fill with goodies and to enter my raffle ticket into a box. Can you spot me in the photo below taken from the fest facebook page?

source-Mad City Facebook page

While I disliked waiting in line, I later thanked myself for doing so. When it was hard to get lunch at the food court (because of the long lines), I snacked on the peeled snacks coco nosh trail mix! 

I headed back into the main building to hear Dama Wells-Foster, owner of Sol D'Licious Cafe in Kenosha, provide a great cooking demonstration. 

Dama made four recipes and we got to sample every single one of them. We started with Tofu Scramble, which I can't wait to make at home sometime soon.

Next was the Mock Tuna Salad. I have made a similar recipe countless times, but Dama's tasted great and I liked the texture since she placed all of the ingredients in a food processor.

Her veggie burger was excellent too and had a chickpea base, so that was different than a lot of veg burgers I've had before. 

Finally, dessert was Chocolate Mousse made with avocados, cinnamon, almond milk, etc. It was delicious!

I was really hungry and hit up the food court after the presentation. Unfortunately, the only food booth that had a reasonable line was the Green Mustache juice one, so I headed there for a juice.

I wanted to get to one more presentation before heading home, RD Jack Norris's Vegan Nutrition talk. He is the co-author of Vegan for Life.

I figure I may go vegan at some point in my life, but many statistics Jack showed made me feel pretty good about being a vegetarian too. For more info, check out his website, VeganHealth.org.

I can't wait to check out the other speakers I missed when their videos are posted on the Mad City Vegan Fest website. 

I am looking forward to returning for the 2016 Fest! I enjoyed my day in Madison immensely. While I felt like the event was super crowded and I was disappointed I couldn't eat delicious vegan food like I wanted to, that won't deter me from returning next year.