Wonderful Husband and I were lucky enough to be invited to the wedding of our mega friends Lovely Harman and Lovely Brigita. Best of all, the wedding was being held in Vilnius, Lithuania. I love a location wedding!
As well as wanting to celebrate the union of two mega friends, I totally wanted to check out the vegan food in Vilnius. You’d expect it to be all about meat, meat and meat right? Prepare yourself to be surprised.
We had an amazing time eating our way around Vilnius, check out the mega places below 🙂
Brussels Airport, Belgium – EXKi
Yep, I know what you’re thinking: Brussels isn’t in Lithuania, it isn’t even close but…
My trip started with an incredibly early flight to Vilnius via Brussels. I was super hungry and began to explore the airport during my short wait between flights. I couldn’t believe my luck when I found EXKi. There were several vegan options but I struck gold when I found my sandwich: smoked tofu, carrots and seaweed tartare. I hate flying but this made the experience that tiny bit more enjoyable.
Rosehip Bistro
After an amazing walking tour around the city centre, Wonderful Husband and I had worked up quite an appetite and headed over to a highly recommended vegan burger bar: The Rosehip Bistro. Their menu was fantastic and it was incredibly hard to choose but in the end we shared yummy vegan nachos and I had a portobello burger that had a beautiful cheesy, mayonnaise-y sauce, totally my kind of thing. We stuffed ourselves with the loveliness so much that we couldn’t eat dessert.
The food doesn’t actually have a pink tint to it, we were just under a pink light 🙂
Vegafe
We are so used to Spanish time, where you head to a restaurant at 20:30-21:00 for dinner (or even later!) so it was quite hard to adapt to the idea of having an early dinner, as most of the restaurants in Vilnius were closing their kitchens by 20:30. Fortunately for us Vegafe was open until 22:00 and even better, their food was yummy! The staff there were lovely and the restaurant had a very calm atmosphere.
Vegafe doesn’t sell alcohol (to Wonderful Husband’s disappointment) but they did offer the most wonderful home-made ginger lemonade – it was super spicy! For dinner we shared a huge plate of gyozas and then I had a tofu steak with rice and salad. Who said vegans don’t get enough protein?!
Beigelistai
Our second day of the trip was all about seeing Vilnius by visiting vegan-friendly places (check out the map!). We had our walking shoes strapped on tightly and with a hunger in our bellies we began our journey.
Our first stop was at Beigelistai for some breakfast. I loved the setting of this super quaint cafe as it was on a street near Užupis (Vilnius’ art district) next to a wall dedicated to authors that wrote about Lithuania – how cool!?
We both went for the peanut butter and banana bagel. It came with yummy chunky peanut butter, slices of bananas and the most wonderfully tasty, chewy bagel that had been toasted and ready for self-assembly. We both loved our bagel and I was super disappointed that we didn’t have time to return. I have been desperately craving bagels since!
Boho Cafe (Boho Kavine)
Our second stop was at Boho Cafe, quite a walk away from the main town but totally worth it. A few steps down led you into a small cafe filled to the brim with uni students feasting on yummy veggie lunches. We arrived too late for lunch so instead we grabbed a pastry and fruit juice. It was yummy and perfect for a short stop on our tiny food tour of Vilnius.
Chaika
This was, without a doubt, Wonderful Husband’s absolute favourite place to eat over the whole trip. This little cafe was so quirky and wonderfully inviting, that instead of getting food to take away as originally planned, we decided to sit in and relax, their chairs were so comfortable!
We both ordered a toastie with the hope of having enough room to fit in dessert, but alas, it was not meant to be. We ordered both BBQ jackfruit and cheesy mushroom toasties. Both toasties were scrummy! Can you believe I caught Wonderful Husband stealing my toastie?! I don’t blame him though, they were delicious.
We also had the yummiest drinks at Chaika (check out their little glass cosies!): hot chocolate with soya milk and a rooibos tea with cinnamon and hazelnut milk (they had a lot of milk options!). If we ever have the opportunity to return to Vilnius then Chaika will be one of the first places we head back to.
Also, many thanks to Chaika for providing my mega cover photo today, displaying their delicious vegan cupcakes 🙂
Holy Donut
Whilst on our mega walking tour the guide actually stopped outside a donut shop and said ‘Are there any vegans in the group?’ It turned out that 3 out of the 15 people were vegan (20% of the group – not bad!). The tour guide then went on to explain that Holy Donut offer vegan donuts.
It took a while for my mouth to close.
So of course, Holy Donut was on our check-out list on the day two tour of Vilnius. There were 5 vegan donuts to choose from (quite a selection!) and I chose the chocolate icing and pistachio crumb choice. It was yummy but I couldn’t finish it. Wonderful Husband made it worse because, as soon as he noticed I was struggling, he offered a bet: if I ate five donuts in the next hour, we could rescue another dog – he is so mean 🙂 ! I agreed to the challenge but then he added I wasn’t allowed to throw up which made it pretty much impossible and so I declined.
I would definitely try this place again on an empty belly. I’ll pretend to be full up and then Wonderful Husband will hopefully offer me the same bet 😉
Gyvas Baras
First off, I love the name of this restaurant, I love that it rhymes. Google translate tells me that it means ‘Lively Bar’ in Lithuanian but I much prefer the original.
Gyvas Baras was our last stop on our food tour of Vilnius. It’s a totally vegan bar serving food – the perfect end to a perfect day. They have a great menu here and we got the most amazing onion rings to start off with (I love onion rings!). For our mains I had fish (tofu wrapped in seaweed and battered) and chips and Wonderful Husband had a BBQ jackfruit burger. The food was yummy and our expectations were definitely met given that the bar has amazing reviews on Trip Advisor.
Leyla
On the third day in Vilnius, a group of our friends met up at Leyla, a super vegan-friendly Lebanese restaurant in Vilnius. I loved the food here, mostly because I could order one of my favourite meals… Bread, chips and humus. I love the combination of bread, chips and humus and Leyla served the most delicious humus. I also got stuffed cabbage leaves on the side which were yummy. If you’re a humus lover then you should definitely check out this restaurant!
On an even more impressive note, every Monday Leyla takes part in vegan Mondays!!! This is an amazing initiative taken by this restaurant and I encourage you guys to head there on a Monday (and let me know what it is like please!). Thank you Leyla for encouraging veganism 🙂
Hesburger
The third day ended quite late so myself, fellow vegan Mega Phil and Wonderful Husband went off in search of late night vegan food. We came across Hesburger, a fast food chain, which offered SOYA MEAT TORTILLA(!) and it tasted surprisingly good. Under the same circumstances I would totally eat at Hesburger again, the vegan alternative to a late night kebab 🙂
Botanique
We thought we’d eat something healthier for lunch on the day of the wedding as we expected the evening would entail a *cough* lot *cough* of drinking, so we headed for the raw vegan restaurant Botanique.
To my recollection we hadn’t tried a raw vegan restaurant before so this was something a bit different and we were definitely not disappointed. I had the raw ravioli with ‘melt in the mouth’ cashew cream cheese and Wonderful Husband had raw quesadillas. I thought the quesadillas were great but the ravioli blew my mind! It was one of the most amazing and refreshing meals I’ve ever tried. For dessert we had a raw lime cake and Wonderful Husband had a berry souffle. Both were mega and I would totally recommend heading to Botanique for a light lunch.
We had the most fabulous time checking out different restaurants in Vilnius but I also learnt a great tip: learn the word for ‘milk’ before you go to a foreign country. In Vilnius it came in very handy when I was scouring the aisles of the local supermarket looking for bread without milk. If you ever travel to Lithuania then the word for milk is pienas. It’s easy to remember because it sounds like penis 😂
Happy Cow is largely responsible for my mega time in Vilnius so I would highly recommend checking out the website before you go travelling. Enjoy! 💚
Enjoying your food tour.xx
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So fun to turn a wedding trip into a food extravaganza! Love it 🙂
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It really was!! 💚
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Lithuania has never been on my travel list but this totally inspires me to check out some pics on pinterest for the vibe!
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You should totally do Lithuania. I loved it and now I’m wondering what other countries to do nearby 💚
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Lithuania isn’t really thought of as a tourist destination, but I really want to go now!! So much delicious looking food to try. Thanks for sharing!
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Very happy you got to see a different side to Lithuania 🙂 💚
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WOW! My mouth is watering. I especially what to try that pistachio crumb doughnut, what a beautiful and delicious dessert!
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Haha that’s the same thing that happened to me!! But my eyes were bigger than my belly and I couldn’t finish it – such a regret!! 💚
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I’ve never been to Lithuania, but I’m quite familiar with the country as my first internet friend when I was in elementary school was this boy from Vilnius. I saw the pictures of the city back in the days and mesmerized. Never heard from him again nowadays, but I’d love to go to Lithuania someday.
It’s great that they’ve also got numerous places that are vegan-friendly. Thank you for sharing! 😀
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Fab! Thanks for sharing.
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That looks delicious! I’d love to try the Holy Donut!
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It was yummy! 💚
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Destination weddings are always fun!
Amazing variety of vegan dishes. I hope to get to Lithuania some day.
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I was super surprised by the amazing dishes available in Lithuania. I would highly recommend 🙂 💚
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As a vegetarian this gives me hope. Can’t wait to visit Lithuania soon. 🙂
❥ tanvii.com
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Oh you definitely should!! They are soooo many amazing places to eat in Vilnius 💚
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The food looks amazing! Looks like a great trip!
-Jennifer
https://maunelegacy.com
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It really really was!! 💚
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Simply love the foods that you shared. Hope you had an amazing time.
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Ahhh thank you Talha. I had a fantastic time 💚
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These options all look so delicious! I actually love Exki, theres one sandwich with an olive tapenade that I always devour!
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Oh I wish I had tried it… I LOVE tapenade 💚
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Sometimes it seems so hard to travel with food restrictions! Great shares, now I just need to take a vacation haha
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One of my favorite parts of a new adventure is trying out different and new foods! All of the food you tried look amazing!!
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I completely agree! Since going vegan I have such a desire to find new vegan food 💚
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All of the dishes look so delicious! So many healthy options!
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There were many healthy dishes… Not so much the donut haha! 💚
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I think I could eat 5 donuts in an hour. Especially if a rescue dog was involved! That BBQ jackfruit burger sounds pretty good.
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Hahahaha I love your spirit!! I could have used your help at the time 💚
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Wow, these meals sound absolutely delicious!!
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Raw ravioli and vegan Mondays? You had an amazing trip for a vegan! Sounds sooo yummy and fun!
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I truly did. I would highly recommend anyone to check out Vilnius 💚
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Vilnius is a city which I’d love to visit, especially because of the fact that it’s located in our neighbour country. I love the places you presented in your article. All the meals look really delicious! 🙂
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Oh you really should – especially if it’s so close to you! Such an amazing place to go and explore 💚
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Those are great finds! I like that you made use of your time in Vilnius by searching for vegan food. You’re helping a lot of people! Kudos!
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Ahhh such a sweet comment, thank you Karla 💚
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I’m actually drooling. All of the food sounds so good! Glad you had a lovely time
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Hahah I soooo wish I could go back and eat it all again! Thanks for your mega comment 💚
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These meals seem really tasty! Some people at my work say that vegan food doesn’t really taste good, but I have tried a few, and I beg to differ. I t actually think most of them taste decent. However, I haven’t tried a lot of specialty vegan food, but would like to someday.
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Hahah yes there is a weird stigma when it comes to vegan food. People think all vegan food is weird, however we’ve all eaten an apple haha! Lovely that you like to try new things and you have an open mind when it comes to veganism 💚
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It sounds like you had a great time! Trey and I definitely need to vacation over there sometime so I can get my hands on those vegan donuts…..
Truth be told, I plan things entirely around what kind of food I want….
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We had a fab time and you guys would love it!!
To be fair when we’re not going somewhere for a wedding then we are going somewhere for the food haha!! 💚
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everything looks so tasty!
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It was!! I would totally recommend 💚
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😊
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