For the best chance of securing a table at a vegan restaurant in the UK, you need to head to the glorious city of Norwich.
Home to cobbled streets, two cathedrals and a thriving arts scene, the Norfolk hotspot has now been named the UK’s most vegan-friendly city, too, thanks to the number of meat-free restaurants it has for the size of the population.
Edinburgh and Glasgow are the second and third most accommodating cities in the UK for those who practise a vegetarian or vegan diet, according to the research.
London didn’t quite make the top 10. Despite having a number of vegan and veggie eateries, the capital’s huge population means finding a table can be tricky, leaving at number 11 on the list.
The research, conducted by catering equipment retailer Nisbets, found 6.5 million UK adults are now ditching their meat-based meals for vegan or vegetarian alternatives. Opting for a vegan/vegetarian lifestyle was found to be most popular among 25-34-year-olds, with one in 10 proudly identifying as such.
The team surveyed 1,000 adults to explore dietary choices and how frequently they visit a restaurant or café which caters specifically to a vegan and vegetarian diet.
They also looked at Google search trend data and examined the number of searches around the term ‘vegan and vegetarian restaurants’, cross referencing the findings with the number of vegan and vegetarian restaurants listed per city, according to Happy Cow, an online service that lists vegan, vegetarian and healthy-eating restaurants.
Norwich claimed the crown as Britain’s most vegetarian and vegan-friendly city, with just 2,094 people in the city per vegetarian/vegan restaurant.
Scotland also proved to have a strong reputation as a meatless dining hotspot, with both Edinburgh (2,631) and Glasgow (3,000) laying claim to second and third place in the top ten.
The UK’s top 10 vegetarian/vegan friendly cities:
1. Norwich
2. Edinburgh
3. Glasgow
4. Newcastle
5. Bristol
6. Manchester
7. Liverpool
8. Cardiff
9. Southampton
10. Nottingham