Out & About ~ Abergavenny Food Festival

Posted by Chef Hermes on September 19, 2012 · Comments Off

For those of you that are regular readers & followers on the social networks, will know I was at the Abergavenny food festival last weekend. Despite posting a list at the start of every month of the up & coming food festivals, due to work commitments this year Abergavenny is actually the first festival I’ve been to I’m ashamed to say.

The growth & rising reputation of Abergavenny as one of the food festivals to visit is well deserved and putting it into the top tier along with such gastronaut destinations as Ludlow, Exeter and Taste of London, which gather much of the food media attentions. Such is the pull of Abergavenny many of the profile food writers, personalities & chefs make appearances. During my visit I was fortunate to meet or see: Joanna Blythman; The fabulous Baker Brothers (Tom & Henry Herbert); Simon Wright; Kate Humble; Atul Kotcher & Claudia Roden, with such diversity there is something for everybody.

Needless to say with it being on the doorstep of South Wales food bloggers Mark & Carol Adams aka Corpulent capers & Babettes Ffest, it would have been rude not to say hi & have a good catch up over some churros & coffee. Mark & Carol were present for both days of the food festival & even took part in the bloggers breakfast, but I’ll let them tell you about that. On the whole they’d enjoyed the various talks they had been to & the Pierre Koffmann in conversation with Matthew Fort event seems to have been a highlight, with Mr Koffmann being particularly candid with his thoughts on the Fat Duck.

Now as popular as Abergavenny was this year, with a rumoured 40,000 people attending at some point over the weekend, it actually put this into perspective and answered a question that Xanthe Clay posed in The Daily Telegraph a couple of weeks ago. In answer to your question Ms Clay, the reason television companies don’t make shows for ‘foodies’ is the economics of it. The reason all the names that you despise have shows & probably more in the pipeline is that foodism or what ever you would like to call it is a minority activity. I’ll put this into context for you, more people turn up at Anfield (Liverpool FC’s home ground) every second week than attend an annual event like Abergavenny. Many would say that events like food festivals have elitist undertones, but by the turn out I witnessed nothing could be further from the truth.

On having a wander around the center of the town I came across a gentleman handing out leaflets, who spotting the slightly nerd look I have coupled with the big Nikon I was carrying, approached me. He was rallying support for where the locals are being abandoned by their local representatives. Abergavenny is not dis-similar to the town I live in, our high street is under siege from not one but two supermarkets. The Welsh residents have formed a group (KALM: Keep Abergavenny Livestock Market) and so far have seen off the mighty WalMart. The community wants to keep their high street & town the way it is, yet their local MP & Assembly member don’t want to listen. Instead they clearly think that the might of the food lobby knows best, rather than the community. If you can help their cause, please click through to the KALM:Keep Abergavenny Livestock Market website.

Through the day I was hearing heart warming stories of stall holders running out of produce, the one that particularly struck a chord with me was the tale of Bocaddon Veal Farm. They sold out completely on the Saturday afternoon, seeing the need for more stock they drove back to their base in Cornwall, butchered the meat & returned back to the festival in time for opening on the Sunday. Although this was an extreme case, I heard many more similar examples which is great news for the small artisan traders investing their time in festivals like this up & down the country.

What I love about food festivals in general, not just Abergavenny, is the produce & producers. You’ll find products which aren’t widely available, some of my purchases over the weekend were: Diced goat meat; Lime vodka & Tracklements horseradish. Yes, many of you may say they are niche products but life would be dull if we just accepted the large corporations mediocre standards. I some respects we need food festivals & the artisan producers who make them special, to prove that excellence is worth paying for.

Long live Abergavenny & similar food festivals.