The main event for us is now over. Yesterday we attended the second semi final, the first and last time we would visit Malmö Arena, where the real festivities take place. So today was a welcome distraction, allowing us a whole day to chill, explore the city, and try out some of the restaurants we had on our list. Malmö caters well for vegans, and falafel seems to be the city’s speciality.

Our first port of call was Glassfabriken, a cafe run by left wing youths, where toasted sandwiches, veggieburgers and the like are on offer. As expected, we got good value for money, as well as plain, decently prepared grub. They will never win any prizes for their cuisine, the decor was not really inviting, and the music inside was not at all soothing, but it was an affordable way to get some tasty food in our tummies.

We made our way to Folkets Park, or were we led there in our hunt for street art? As it turned out, the park was both large and child friendly, more than normal parks are. There were many things for the kids to do (playground, paddling pool, a water structure in the form of a flower, terrarium and very small theme park with a couple of rides), with the essential pub placed near the hub of the park. We decided it would be here we would watch the final. A scene had been built for pre show entertainment, and a large screen erected next to it. It looked like there was enough of a grassy area to hold many hundreds of people, and since there were other places doing something similar for the final, we would have a calm and pleasant time here.

A quick drink and visit to the paddling pool later, we took ourselves to the nearby raw food place, Raw Food House. We were not overly hungry, but it gave us the chance to tick off one of our desired food experiences. And, of course, they served wine. We tried three different cheesecakes, all of which were excellent. We also polished off a bottle of white wine. Our overall impression off the establishment was positive, and the interior was fresh and simple, without crossing the line to hippiedom. It would have been nice to have tried one of the main dishes, but we were simply too full from our earlier meal.

After a time out at the flat, we made our way to another talked about vegan restaurant, Vegegården. A vegan Asian restaurant with self proclaimed well spiced foood, this place had received good reviews, and our expectations were high. Sadly, the food was neither exciting or well spiced. In fact, it is probably the blandest Asain food we have tasted, and their red curry could have easily been replicated with any shop bought red curry paste. The best part of the meal was the spring rolls, but those were merely average. A very disappointing offering, which is a shame, since it is not a satisfactory advert for vegan food.

We went home and got a bit drunk. That saved the evening a tad.