Scottish Restaurant Wins Top Prize At Vegan Food Awards

Forgan's Broughty Ferry restaurant located in Dundee scooped an award for best vegan fish in PETA's annual Vegan Food Awards.

Recently the city has become a popular place for vegans with many high-quality vegan bars offering extensive vegan menu options.

PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) awards honour the best vegan food products and restaurant offerings available on the market that would satisfy everybody, not only vegan customers. Last week, the charity announced its 2020 vegan food winners, with big brands such as KFC and Nando's winning prizes for their vegan-friendly menu options. 

Dundee-based restaurant Forgan's Broughty Ferry won the award for Best Vegan Fish.

The eatery makes its "fish" from a banana-based plant and coats it in vegan beer batter. The fish is served with chips, tartare sauce, lemon and crushed peas. PETA wrote in the verdict: "This dish gives you all the flavours of the sea without harming our ocean friends."

General manager Ben Etchels didn't even know that the restaurant had been considered for the award until he saw its name on the list of winners. 

He told Evening Telegraph: "We didn't even enter for the award and apparently we were just picked by PETA out of all the restaurants in the UK. We're still not sure how we were chosen and whether somebody suggested it who had been to visit us.

"Our vegan fish is a popular dish – we have lots of people coming to try it and most of them say they think it's brilliant, so someone who had popped in to try it may have recommended us to PETA.

"The dish has been on the menu since just after Christmas. The idea came about as we wanted to have a range of vegan products and that was one where, once we'd tried it, we thought it was brilliant, and that's why we put it on the menu.

He said: "We have no idea if anyone else really uses it, to be honest – it's the first time that I've come across it – which is why we've put it on our menu.

"The feedback on it has been brilliant, so we've just kept it as one of our dishes.

"It's been a popular choice previously, and now, ever since we got this award last week, it's kind of blown up, and we've had lots of customers coming through the doors to try it.

"We don't have plans to do any more vegan products at the moment as we're happy to stick with our 'vegan fish' as that's a bit of a winner, but we're likely to branch out to other vegan options in the future. Veganism is a growing culture at the minute, and it's something we'll be looking to build on."