Dartmouth Food Festival

Latest News

Double Michelen starred chef, Michael Caines, signs up for the 2009 Festival

Seahorse 1986 Bordeaux Dinner
1986 is without doubt a great vintage especially for Saint Julien. Many
chateaux produced wines at their deepest and most concentrated since
1982. We will be serving three wonderful wines Chateau Beychevelle,
Chateau Leoville Barton and Chateau Ducru Beaucaillou. Chateau Beychevelle 1986 Fourth Growth - One of the best Beychevelle’s
in the last 30 years. Chateau Leoville Barton 1986 Second Growth - extraordinary power, density and richness, without doubt a wonderful wine still youthful, it is suggested Leoville Barton will drink for half a century. Chateau Ducru Beaucaillou 1986 Second Growth - the essence of elegance, symmetry, balance, breed, class and distinction.

Join Mitch and Tim for a dinner of Bordeaux wines form the 89 vintages -
have a place at the table of a whole table of 6 for £145 person and
experience the following wines with a menu cooked especially for the
table. *Only 12 spaces available.* £145.00 per person For futher information or to book call 01803 835147

Breaking news! Michael Caines MBE will be helping Mitch Tonks get the party started on Wednesday, 21 October. Watch this space...

Local College Students Support the 2009 Festival
Six pupils from the Food Technology Course at Dartmouth Community College are going to be this year's Young Foodies. David Jones, Festival Chairman, welcomed the enthusiastic youngsters to his cooking school, Manna from Devon, for a hands-on day in June that covered making bread through to cleaning mackerel and scallops. The intrepid youngsters will be helping out in various ways in the run-up to the Festival in October so look out for them and say hello...

Midsummer Cruise Success June 2009
Following an evening of food, fun and frivolity aboard the Dart Explorer, over £2000 was raised to support the 2009 festival. Local chefs Mitch Tonks, Holly Jones and Serin Aubrey provided a seafood feast fit for Midas himself, with music from South-West based jazz singer, Louise Parker, and great wine from the Smith Street Deli. Looks as though this could be a more regular event so get in touch if you'd like to come along to the next one.

Fergus Henderson, star of Channel 4's Could You Eat an Elephant, comes to the Festival
Not only are Michael Caines and Mitch Tonks going to be at the launch party on 21 October, but top chef and self-proclaimed carnivore, Fergus Henderson is also joining us. You may have seen the article on Fergus in the Sunday Times (19 July 2009) but to quote... 'Fergus Henderson's pared-down whitewashed restaurant, St John, in Smithfield, London... has become sacred ground for foodies....'. Find out more about Fergus at Chef Patrons.

Look like a real chef
It's not just Dartmouth chefs that can wear our exclusive Dartmouth Food Festival apron, now you can too. Drop into the Tourist Information Office or Smith Street Deli and buy one for just £7.50. And if an apron isn't enough, then splash out on the new eco-shopping bag for just £3.50. Buy both and they're yours for a mouth watering £10...

From the chairman:
The Dartmouth Food Festival organisers have pulled out all the stops this year, and are expanding the Festival with new locations, more trade stalls, two demonstration theatres, a wider range of events and big names throughout the Festival.

The Festival will be opened by Mitch Tonks, Michael Caines and Fergus Henderson on Wednesday 21st with a seafood cooking demonstration on Dartmouth’s South Embankment. This event is scheduled for 2:30 – 4 pm and is open to all. The three celebrity chefs will then appear at a ticket only First night Party at the Flavel Arts centre that evening.

As well as in the Old Market Square, this year’s festival will also be set up on the riverfront to ease congestion at the busy market site and to spread the festival across the town. This will allow for more traders and for an area concentrating particularly on seafood on the riverfront. There will be festival traders on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The Children’s Festival, which takes place on Thursday 22nd has also grown and will involve pre-school children as well as local primary schools. Pupils will attend a series of workshops looking at local food production, healthy eating, basic cooking skills and the environmental impact of food.

David Jones, who runs the Manna from Devon Cooking School and is Chairman of the Food Festival explains, “the feeling was that the Festival had definitely outgrown the Old Market but moving to a completely new location is not an option. We really want to stay in the heart of Dartmouth where we can involve the whole town and create a better atmosphere. Also, the River Dart is Dartmouth and we should be making as much use of it as possible, so putting stalls and demonstrations there is a natural progression for us. Widening the net to more children is also a step in the right direction as we’ve always aimed to involve the whole community in the event”.

Another new initiative is an increased involvement for Dartmouth Community College. As in previous years, students from the college will take part in the Young Chefs Competition organised by the local Rotary group but two additional groups will also take part. One group, the Festival Young Foodies, will help with demonstrations and workshops alongside some of the town’s professional chefs whilst the other, the Food Apprentices, will devise and produce a range of products to be sold at the market as a business project.

Other highlights include art and food projects tying in with Dartmouth’s open Galleries evening on Friday 23rd, an Irish Food and Music evening in conjunction with Dart Music Festival, a Food Festival Film Festival including a screening of Sweeney Todd sponsored by Chunk Pies, and a Big Cream Tea event in aid of Dartmouth Caring.

It looks like this years Dartmouth Food Festival will be the best ever and the annual event seems likely to be a firm fixture in the Dartmouth calendar. David Jones.

20 October 2009