Foodies Festival (reviewed): May Bank Holiday weekend
The first time I went to Foodies Festival was when it was held on Hove Lawns, back in 2017. Every year it seems to grow.
Over time, I have returned from the festival laden with cheese, artisanal rum, gin, cured meats and sauces.
This year, however, I was going with my two children aged seven and 11, to sample an altogether different day out.
The first thing we signed up for was a learn-to-cook class with a specialist teacher. I was going over the weekend and knew other parents were attending, so the plan was to try and see as much of everything.
We started, however, in the children’s tent with a question:
“Is the cucumber a fruit or a vegetable?“ The specialist teacher presiding over the kids cookery tent asked the young crowd. A few blank faces, a few hands shot up in the air.
It is, she explained, a fruit! Similar to the tomato, a cucumber has seeds, which means you can grow more of them if you so wish.
But this wasn’t just a fact-finding mission. The children made flatbread alongside each other, carefully chopping herbs and sprinkling lentils into the dough.
The end result? “Is ok” my youngest said. Well, you can’t please everyone. And on the way into the tent he spied ice cream vans, artisanal doughnuts, candy floss and chocolate-covered strawberries.
Samples were had of all.
We tried the Cake & Bake theatre also, though it was hard for them to sit still for the whole demonstration. The promise of a tempting slice of cake afterwards, kept them still enough however!
The children were interested in the food being sold more than anything. We tried Persian chicken, dried mango, Sri Lankan curry, lobster rolls and spicy dumplings.
There was also a Latin American vendor, where I was delighted to find Inca Kola (the Peruvian national drink, which I lived on for the year I was there), and the children, put off by the vibrant neon yellow of the drink, settled on tasting Venezuelan queso fresco and plantain.
They had strawberries in Dubai chocolate and were handed bubblegum lollipops by chirpy vendors.
Obviously, the main attraction for them was, it had to be said, the games and rides.
Bouncy castles, football games, waltzer and other thrilling rides were sampled.
They were sticky and exhausted. Every now and then we’d flop next to the stage and sing along with the act.
We heard from the Brighton rock choir, George Redwood and others who were playing in the scorching sun.
The headline acts: Scouting for Girls on the Saturday and B*witched on Sunday, had us up and dancing, although crowds of by-then quite drunk adults meant it didn’t feel that safe for the children.
However, as VIPs, we could retreat to the VIP tent. This was especially handy to have as a base.
I mean, this is England, and over the weekend we had torrential rain, scorching sun and high winds.
So the covered, spacious tent, with sofas and blankets with water, teas and squash on offer was great.
There was even a bar selling a range of reasonably-priced (£7 for a prosecco and £9 for a cocktail) alcoholic and non-alcoholic cocktails and wines.
I enjoyed a complimentary glass of fizz as a VIP ticket holder and was joined by some other parents.
I managed to pop in and see some of the demonstrations in the tents. I was lucky enough to catch both Peter Datanus, from Burnt Orange and Nigel Brown, from whom I learned how to make the perfect steak.
The top tip? When taking your steak off the heat, transfer to your airfryer at 60 degrees and leave it to rest at that heat for 5-6 minutes.
If I had any criticism of the event I would say that there needed to be more information available and maybe a little more for the many children there.
The website said that there was a kid’s zone, but everything was dotted about and it was hard to see where this started and ended.
More children’s entertainers, like face paints or bubble shows or arts and crafts tables would also be good. There was also no stand for lost children, which is usually a must at big public events like this one across the city.
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