Reepham gets ready for food festival

The second Reepham Food Festival on Sunday 27 May looks set to surpass the sell-out success of the initial 2017 event.
 

 
Visitors will be able to buy local food and drink products from around 50 stalls and concessions in the town’s Market Place, with many new producers this year, including specialist providers of vegetarian, organic and gluten-free products.
 
Local businesses will be well represented with the bar from Panther Brewery and stalls from Eves Hill Veg Co, Crush Foods and Eastgate Larder.
 
The Dial House, the King’s Arms, The Crown, Diane’s Pantry and V’s Café will be taking part, while the WI, the Country Market team and Reepham Scouts will be making their own contributions to the event.
 
Charlie Hodson’s Norfolk Food Heroes are coming to demonstrate cooking skills and recipe ideas on the Woodforde’s cookery stage.
 
Top Norfolk restaurateurs like Roger Hickman and Andrew Jones – now also the new owner of the Dial House – will be joined by expert butchers, foragers and spice producers.
 
The festival opens on Saturday 26 May with a cocktails and canapés evening, with food from the Dial House and new cocktail ideas from St Giles Gin. The closing supper on Sunday 27 May will be a buffet featuring products from the stall-holders. Tickets for both events are available online.
 
Reepham’s schools are taking part with fun science demonstrations at the primary school. Young visitors can try their hand at bashing custard, seeing how food tastes different when it’s cooked, learn how bubbles get into food and use chocolate to measure the speed of light in a microwave. Scientists from the Norwich Research Park will be on hand to explain some of their latest thinking.
 
The high school, meanwhile, is holding a Junior MasterChef competition on Friday 11 May, with the winners to be announced at the festival. The school’s allotment team have been busy growing produce for sale and preparing their plots to show visitors. They have also been growing sample crops for the new farm-to-food demonstrations; these will be shown alongside explanations of processing and finished products.
 
Producers and processors will be on hand to show how to get finished products like beer, rapeseed oil, crisps and bread from crops grown in the fields. There will also be competitions for children to win tasty prizes.
 
The main part of the festival runs from 10 am to 4 pm on Sunday 27 May. Entry is free. More details and up-to-date news at www.reephamfoodfestival.org.uk
 
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