A last-minute date change means a traveller arrives in Vilnius, Lithuania, just in time for the unique Pink Soup Festival, where she learns how this bright and silly celebration represents freedom from historical oppression.
“Would you like to try?”
Having a tray of shot glasses brimming with a luminous liquid thrust under our noses came as a surprise. Firstly, because we were in a Lithuanian park, not a bar. Secondly, it was 9.30 am on a Saturday. And most notably, the shot glasses did not contain the expected potent blast of alcohol, but soup.
Cold. Pink. Soup.
After completing the 5 km parkrun around its pine-canopied paths, we’d come to Vingis Park’s café in search of post-run coffee. The smiling waitress who’d greeted us in the Picnic Bistro’s doorway explained the contents of her loaded tray, and we politely accepted a dinky glass. That’s how we ended up on a shady terrace, in the shadow of Vilnius TV Tower, sampling pulverised beetroot in place of cappuccinos.
The thought of root vegetable soup served chilled didn’t immediately appeal for numerous reasons. But as the cool, fresh liquid hit our exercise-parched throats, its earthy tang, acidic punch and slightly gritty consistency made for an unexpectedly refreshing pick-me-up.
‘Unexpectedly Amazing’ is the slogan coined to describe the experience in the Baltic city of Vilnius, Lithuania. And it was fast becoming our theme. After circumstances meant changing dates for our weekend trip, we’d unwittingly yet happily landed the day before Pink Soup Festival, an annual gastronomic celebration in honour of the national dish, šaltibarščiai.
The cold beetroot, kefir yoghurt, cucumber, dill, and egg soup is a centuries-old recipe, a culinary staple in Lithuania. And for the past three years, for one day, the humble borscht takes centre stage in what’s become recognised as the start of the summer season. Pink Soup Festival draws thousands of locals and visitors from around the globe to Vilnius to enjoy creative adaptations of the revered pink liquid and soak up the revelry and playful spirit. It’s become a cultural emblem, the vibrant colour proudly defying the restrictions imposed on Lithuania during Soviet occupation, which saw state-imposed menus limit food options. Thirty-five years of independence later, such is Pink Soup Fest’s popularity that the 2026 celebrations extended to trickle across an entire, magenta-splashed weekend.
Given we’d found ourselves in Vilnius for Pink Soup Fest 2025 by chance, following its packed programme didn’t feature in our plans. We quickly realised we wouldn’t have a choice. The neon tsunami demanding attention at every turn was impossible to ignore, and strangely hypnotic.
There’d been a none-too-subtle intro from the moment we’d arrived. Lurid cerise slatted chairs were scattered throughout the Old Town, incongruous against the elegant, pristine Gothic and Baroque churches and buildings. In Town Square, an open-air stage decked in shimmering giant pink and silver baubles was prepped for pink-clad performers. Pink paper streamers fluttered from tree branches. Overhead, a billowing fuchsia flag caught the eye, printed with… was that a halved hard-boiled egg and a sprig of dill?
Along Pilies Street, one of the city’s oldest and liveliest veins, cafes, bars, and restaurants got involved in every conceivable way, dressing their frontages with aesthetically pleasing pink blooms and creating festival-friendly menus. We spotted bubblegum-hued cocktails, rose-tinted ice cream and doughnuts, pink-swirled lattes.
Things escalated on Saturday morning, when šaltibarščiai and its ingredients leapt from the menu pages and became a real-life, full-blown, Instagrammable, immersive experience. Our unexpected soup shot samples in the park proved a tame introduction to the eccentricity about to be unleashed across the city throughout the day.
As we left Vingis Park with taste buds piqued, we walked the half hour back into town against a tide of revellers with hair, faces, and limbs tinted, painted, and wrapped in all shades of beetroot. Vingis Park–a 160-hectare carpet of green contributing to Vilnius being named European Green Capital in 2025–was about to turn from lush emerald to hot pink with food pop-ups, costume competitions, and a new twist on the classic egg and spoon race–a soup bowl balancing contest.
We reached Gediminas Avenue, home to government buildings and ordinarily the place for serious and important matters, to find it had taken a frivolous turn. Stilt walkers tottered along the fringes of a crowd gathered to follow a parade featuring life-sized mascots of šaltibarščiai’s component parts. A sausage dog in a fuchsia cowboy hat looked on as boiled eggs twirled batons, a kefir yoghurt carton jived to the beat of a band, while a cheerful cucumber waved at children. In the centre of it all, resplendent in a saucepan seat and pulled along on a carnival float, was the almighty beetroot.
Perhaps looking for reassurance that our earlier shot of soup hadn’t been laced with a hallucinogenic drug, we felt compelled to sample more.
At a buzzy cafe alongside the Vilnia river in the Užupis district, we learned that while fondness for pink soup was clearly universal, variation made it personal; each venue had its own unique take on the recipe. Here, they served egg sliced and skewered on a cocktail stick with a crispy potato wedge, instead of chopped and stirred into the soup as in Vingis Park’s version. And instead of sipping it from shot glasses, we slurped from bowls with spoons. Still, the pleasing umami kick endured.
Our riverside perch wasn’t spared a pink-washing. Tree trunks and branches smothered in bright cloth lined the waterway, and at intervals along the bank, magenta mannequins sporting caps and t-shirts printed with šaltibarščiai ingredients burst through the foliage. The sound of the gushing Vilnia’s flow was interrupted by excited whoops and screams, drowning out the upbeat music filtering from Kūdrų Park across the water. Somehow, it felt fitting that we should stumble across the festival’s wild epicentre by crossing the bridge in Užupis. This part of the city, bordering the Old Town, became an independent sovereign state with its own constitution in 1997. Its bohemian, arty vibe mirrored the freedom, independence, and playfulness exuded by the Pink Soup Fest.
The source of the whoops and screams soon emerged. A 50-metre pink inflatable foam-covered slide had taken over Bastion Hill in the centre of the park. Careening down it at speed were hundreds of fluorescent pink, fancy-dressed people of all ages, merrily plopping out in a representation of a giant bowl of soup. A huge TV screen at the slide’s base captured the resulting exhilaration on participants’ faces.
Elsewhere in Kūdrų Park, the beetroot King and supporting cast members had completed their parade and continued to entertain with an enthusiastic egg/cucumber dance-off. Pink t-shirted volunteers handed out free soup in takeaway coffee cups. And in case you hadn’t had your fill throughout the day, local supermarkets offered overflowing sacks of the requisite vegetables and herbs to help you recreate the dish at home.
We’d pre-booked a hot air balloon flight that evening, another activity unique to this part of the world – Vilnius is the only European city in which you can fly over its centre. A 45-minute car journey whisked us out of town to farmland and a remote field take-off spot. Rather than relishing some respite from the sensory overload, we had mixed feelings about floating away from the action. We needn’t have worried: the altitude gave a new perspective on the ongoing festivities. Echoes of music and energetic crowds from the main square’s wrap concert reached us in our basket in the sky. And as the sun dipped on the day of celebrations, the festival shone bolder and brighter, with bridges, historical buildings, and the Vilnius TV tower illuminated with a flamboyant, rosy glow among the terracotta rooftops.
