Charlottesville’s twelfth-annual Cville Veg Fest — a beloved festival celebrating all things vegan — turned a stretch of blacktop and muraled walls into a kaleidoscope of color, sound and most notably, taste. I made the effort to sample as many of the festival’s offerings as I could, and even still, I was left wanting more.
Beginning in 1996, the festival is now a staple of the city’s fall calendar. Free-to-enter, it drew crowds with live music, family activities, advocacy booths and dozens of vendors, proving that vegan food can be both indulgent and innovative.
Though I ventured to the festival to taste the myriad of delicious treats, Cville Veg Fest proved to be much more than a food fair. The event was hosted by Freddy Jackson of LoveNoEgo — a fundraising community movement centered on compassion, awareness and young-adult empowerment. The festival’s mission, according to its organizers, is rooted in nonviolence — a call to resist not only animal exploitation but also racism, sexism, homophobia and other forms of systemic harm…