The Real Food Festival lives up to its name

THE REAL FOOD FESTIVAL

I first heard about the Real Food Show happening all this weekend 25-27 April at Earl’s Court 1 www.realfoodfestival.co.uk back in October of last year, appropriately enough at the Abergavenny Food Festival. Called me a hardened cynic if you dare, but I wasn’t entirely convinced the plan for a London take on Salone del Gusto (the wonderful bi-annual Slow Food event in Turin) would come to fruition.
Fortunately the enthusiasm and sheer determination of everyone involved has made it happen, and judging from the opening trade/launch preview it is gong to be a fantastic and rather different addition to the other mass-scale food shows.

What makes The Real Food Festival truly different and worth visiting in my view is that the organisers have been able to lure the truly small, quirky and delectable artisan producers who simply wouldn’t be able to afford the charges made by other more established events. This is largely due to adopting Slow Food Salone del Gusto’s policy of having sustainers such as Wholefoods Market (who do stock many of those producers exhibiting), daylesford organic, Grana Padano, delicious magazine, Tyrrell’s and others who effectively subsidise the cost of the small players participating.

Among far too many empassioned and intriguing producers to even single out all those whose samples tasted so delicious I had to buy stashes for later, a few of my absolute favourites well-worth seeking out are:

Jules and Sharpie’s irresistible hot preservaments hand made in Suffolk include chilli mint jelly to accompany salt marsh lamb and irresistible hot mango chutney www.julesandsharpie.com;

Tea Together’s utterly exquisite, highly seasonal, organic hand-made jams such as summer pudding with vanilla pod, rhubarb, lemon & angelica and apricot with lavender leaf. These jams are usually only available in top hotels such as The Berkeley, The Grove and Browns. Plus Ttogether’s new range of “Orchard haute couture” products such as sun-dried white figs stuffed with an almond, citrus zest and wild fennel seeds, Quercy candied walnuts and the most decadent Agen plums mi cuit and conserved in Eau de Vie de Pruneaux and dipped in dark chocolate. www.teatogether.com

Clippy’s Apples, based in Cheshire whose preserves are based on British apples.
I particularly liked the apple, saffron and cumin chutney made with British Bramleys, Chivers Delight and Belle De Boskoop apples and fragrant with saffron and freshly ground cumin and the Barmley apple, thyme and garlic jelly.
www.clippys.com

Emeyu Tea, who source and blend a fabulous selection of traditional Chinese loose leaf teas beautifully eco-packaged. Owner Kristiane promises me that if I sip the Puerh tea after every meal not only will it aid digestion but help see the excess pounds shift.
www.emeyu.com

The Giggly Pig Company whose owner Tracy Mackness frankly admits she first learnt how to raise pigs whilst “inside” for drug offences. She now has her own outdoor rare breed British saddleback pigs and produces 40+ varieties including lemon & fennel, chestnut, lime & sweet chilli and cider apple which are all exceptionally meaty, flavoursome and fulsome. T 07944 610834 for details of farmer’s markets from Dulwich and Vauxhall to Reigate, Southend and Harlow.

Artisan du Chocolate, one of the few British producers to conch their own chocolate from ground cocoa beans. I’m especially partial to the Moroccan mint and apricot “O”s or thins and the exceptional liquid salted caramels which they were the first to introduce to the UK.
www.artisanduchocolate.com


Arabica Food and Spice for their unrivalled Damascean falafel (as served in Borough Market every weekend) plus exotic spices from sumac and zatar to definitive pomegranate molasses.
www.pulsefoodislife.com

What’s more I really liked the fact that there are hands-on cookery workshops run by Barny Haughton from Bristol’s Bordeaux Quay Restaurant and Cookery School giving realistic advice on how eat real food without spending a fortune, delicius magazine workshops/tutored tastings ranging from oysters and champagne to discovering Portugal’s sheep’s cheeses and British game and meeting Blur musician turned cheesemaker Alex James. Even the chef demos are not the usual over-exposed celebs but those who truly uphold the Real Food ethos including Raymond Blanc, Shane Osborn of Pied a Terre, Ashley Palmer-Watts of The Fat Duck, Sophie Conran and Oliver Rowe of Prince Konstam.