She may look fierce here, but MasterChef 2014 alum Renae Smith will do you no harm – especially if you're an animal. Since her stint on the cooking show, the Newtown mum of two has been vegan, and has found her niche in cruelty-free cooking.

Today Smith will demonstrate how to make her sugar-free, raw, vegan lemon meringue cream pie, at the 10th Cruelty Free Festival at the Australian Technology Park's Exhibition Hall in Eveleigh. The dessert tastes every bit as delicious as any traditional version.

Renae Smith will demonstrate how to make a vegan lemon meringue cream pie at the Cruelty Free Festival

The festival, which runs from 10am to 5pm today ($5 entry, kids free) boasts a star-studded line-up, including host Osher Gunsberg, comedians Tom Ballard and Rodney Todd, US vegan bodybuilder Robert Cheeke​ and renowned wingsuit pilot Heather Swan. Smith's 13-year-old daughter Kaya will be on stage too, showing how to make a vegan gingerbread-house kit. It's one the festival's many delightful and easy ideas for leading a kinder life.

Smith, who had been intermittently vegetarian before MasterChef, says the show convinced her to go completely vegan.

"When we were filming, I was eating what everyone else was: a lot of meat. I started to feel quite ill. And then, eventually, even the smell was making me feel sick. I said: 'I can't do this any more'."

A vegan diet, says Smith, "is not as hard as people think", and she backs it up with vegan degustations and tempting recipes.

"I feel brighter. I go past the butcher and I don't feel angry, or sad," she says. "I'm doing nothing to hurt animals."