Huddersfield Food and Drink Festival 2012

13 August 2012

A small selection of my snaps from the Huddersfield Food and Drink Festival

Great Saturday afternoon atmosphere – even the sun came out to play!

More 'snaps' from the Huddersfield Food Festival 2012

To those who missed out on the Food Festival, it was a scorcher!
Food festival season is definitely upon us. So, being a massive food fan and giving myself a day off away from the Mac. Last Saturday, I (along with many thousands) flocked to the Huddersfield Food and Drink Festival at St George’s Square to sample produce at more than 70 stalls ranging from speciality breads and cupcakes; exotic meats, vegetables, olives, preserves, chutneys, savoury and sweet pies; from farm shops to gastro pubs, local breweries to cheesemakers. There was A LOT of food choice!!

Food festivals are a great chance to sample bites from your favourite restaurants, food producers and also try new ones. The Huddersfield festival’s programme also featured master classes from award-winning chefs but whilst I was there (Saturday afternoon 2-6pm) I didn’t get the chance to catch any cooking demos. There were also many activities for the little ones too, including circus skills with Darkley Circus and a ‘how to make pizza dough’ workshop with Pizzatainment which I thought were all nice family-orientated touches.

Oh, and this is a huge pork pie shaped as Huddersfield's Castle Hill by Hinchliffe's Farm Shop. Mouth watering!

We know where it's at: Huddersfield's Food and Drink Festival

Meet Kitchen, producers of beautiful breads, pretty pastries and supa-dupa meringues.

Timothy Bilton at The Butchers Arms with his tasty team serving Yorkshire puds and braised beef.

This was my first visit to the Huddersfield’s Food Festival and they certainly filled me up with treats. I was welcomed and introduced to a feast of the the best regional and local producers, many of which I’d never heard so it was fantastic to sample their food offerings. A handful of stall names I saw and met included the likes of; handmade meat pies from Andrew Jones Pies, Tim Bilton ‏of the Butchers Arms serving a traditional Yorkshire pudding topped with braised Yorkshire beef (the queue was huge for their meals), Villa Farm Shop, Yummy Yorkshire Ice Cream – I cooled off with a two scoop of refreshing mint choccy chip and dandelion and burdock (as pictured above in the tub. Yummy) – I couldn’t decide between their new sundaes or ice cream and I should’ve had both! There was also The Chilli Jam Man, Kitchen – whose stall offered beautiful own-made breads – being a huge artisan bread lover it was hard to ignore their freshly baked fayre, with pretty (too-good-looking to eat) pastries and supa-dupa meringues (as pictured above); Round Green Farm Venison Company also caught my lips with their humongous burgers, and just as I was about to leave, I couldn’t leave without tasting Just Jenny’s Ice Cream – I first came across Just Jenny’s creamy stuff from Blacker Hall Farm Shop; Lovely, creamy mint choc chip and banana flavoured ice creams (as pictured above in the cone), and finally I ended my day washing down the day’s cuisine with some coffee from the Grumpy Mule (how cool is their name!? it certainly made me laugh).

There were just so many interesting food and drink stalls to try, and when I got home, I felt one trip just wasn’t enough. A great atmosphere all round, the visitors were really friendly (I didn’t know my way around when I parked up and a lovely lady led me to the Square!), and it was great to see we had the sunshine booked in too! :)

The Sheffield Food Festival 2012
Let’s hope our own Sheffield Food Festival next month gets hungry visitors taste buds tingling and empty bellies filled. When our city’s tastiest food festival returns with a weekend-long menu of food-filled events of eating, cooking and growing on Friday 14 – 16th September. The sharing of good local food encourages me to want to share good feelings so without saying too much, look out for your Missie Cindz lurking around some of these tasty food stalls. Whatever your taste, you’ll be sure to find a food and drink event and stall to whet your appetite!

For more information on the Huddersfield’s Food and Drink Festival visit:
www.htcpl.org.uk/foodanddrinkfestival
Twitter
Facebook

For more information on the Sheffield Food Festival visit:
www.sheffieldfoodfestival.org

Missie Cindz