This article needs additional citations for verification .(March 2020) |
Abergavenny Food Festival | |
---|---|
Genre | Celebration of food and food culture |
Dates | 18–19 September 2021 (3rd weekend in September) |
Location(s) | Abergavenny, Wales |
Founded | 1999 |
Founders | Chris Wardle & Martin Orbach |
Attendance | +35,000 |
Patron(s) | Franco Taruschio, Mr Alun Griffiths |
Website | http://www.abergavennyfoodfestival.com |
The Abergavenny Food Festival is an annual food festival which takes place in the town of Abergavenny in Wales each September.
It was listed as 1 of 50 Best Summer Festivals by The Independent newspaper. [1]
The festival was founded in 1999, by two local farmers, Chris Wardle and Martin Orbach, in the aftermath of the BSE crisis.
"Abergavenny is to food as Cannes is to film – an annual festival for spotting rising stars in Britain's artisan food firmament"
— The Guardian [2]
The 2019 festival was attended by over 35,000 people. [3]
No festival is planned in 2020.
Over the years the festivals celebrity guests have included: Valentine Warner, Tom Parker Bowles, Mitch Tonks, Michael Winner, Matt Tebbutt, Mark Hix, Marguerite Patten OBE, Levi Roots, Keith Floyd, John Burton Race, Valentine Warner, Jay Rayner, Pete Brown, Jason Atherton, Henry Dimbleby, George Alagiah, Franco Taruschio, Fergus Henderson, Christophe Langree, Antonio Carluccio, Anthony Bourdain, Allegra McEvedy, Jose Pizarro, Alex James, Clarissa Dickson Wright, Fergus Henderson, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Asma Khan,
The festival is a non-profit organisation with an unpaid Board of Directors and small core team of year-round part-time staff. The current Chief Executive is Kim Waters, previously the Chairman. The Festival is additionally supported by organisations and individuals in both the public and private sectors.
The planning for the first festival started in 1998. Run by volunteers it was helped by the then 'three towns adviser' of Monmouth, Chepstow & Abergavenny and the Monmouthshire food initiative officer. 39 local food and drink producers exhibited their wares in the Market Hall.
The first programme was a double sided single fold card. There were 2 talks (Attended by 234 people) in the Borough Theatre Marguerite Patten and Franco & Ann Taruschio and, in the evening, Martyn Lewis chaired a debate about GM Foods (Attendance 91).
The Community Banquet (now called the 'Festival Fanfare', also previously referred to as the 'Market Hop' country supper and 'Twmpath'. – On Saturday evening 23 October 1999, the Market Hall hosted 180 people at trestle tables for dinner, punctuated by interludes of song and speech.
Other events included Farm Walks, a Marcher Day apple exhibition, guided tour of Abergavenny Museum, and 'Revolting Rhymes' an exhibition of Children's Verse in Abergavenny Library.
The Abergavenny Market Hall was a key venue and the festival worked with the town hall staff (many of whom are still involved today).
Funding: £15,500 came from a variety of sources. A further £1,800 was raised from private sponsors and in addition the festival made £4,295 from the sale of tickets to events and stall holders etc. Any profits are used to help finance future festivals.
Over the years the festival has grown to become the National Tourism Awards "Best Event in Wales" 2013/14 and Finalist of the "Best Event in Wales ( Large)" 2015 and one of the leading food events in the UK[ citation needed ], attracting visitors from all over the country and from abroad. The event now comprises:
1999 – "GMO's Do we need them?" chaired by BBC Broadcaster Martyn Lewis (Attendance 91) • 2000 – "Organic Food, Hope or Hype?" chaired by BBC Broadcaster Martyn Lewis (Attendance 89) • 2001 – "Beyond Fast Food? A Menu for the 21st Century" Produced in association with the BBC Radio 4 Food Programme and • 2013 – "Do we still need the High Street?" • 2002 – "Today's meat culture is Unsafe, Unsavoury and Unsustainable" chaired by Sheila Dillon • 2012 – "Do we still need the High Street?"• 2013 – "Food or wildlife- are we striking the right balance?" chaired by Sarah Dickens, BBC Wales • 2014 – "Is healthy eating making us ill?" Chaired by Nick Barnard of Rude Health
2007 – "Food Festivals – fads for affluent foodies or can have a real impact on local food culture" chaired by Sheila Dillon, presenter of BBC Radio 4's The Food Programme • 2008 – "Developing Regional & Local Food Tourism in the UK" • 2009 – The Big Food Debate. "Sustainable Food – The Debate over Greening the Food Chain – from Policy to Plate" Covered by The Food Programme on BBC Radio 4. • 2010 – "Food Festivals: The Next Generation" • 2011 – "Changing Attitudes to Local Food" • 2012 – "Food in a Recession"
Abergavenny is a market town and community in Monmouthshire, Wales. Abergavenny is promoted as a "Gateway to Wales"; it is approximately 6 miles (10 km) from the border with England and is located where the A40 trunk road and the recently upgraded A465 Heads of the Valleys road meet.
Monmouthshire is a county in the south east of Wales. It borders Powys to the north; the English counties of Herefordshire and Gloucestershire to the north and east; the Severn Estuary to the south, and Torfaen, Newport and Blaenau Gwent to the west. The largest town is Abergavenny, and the administrative centre is Usk. The county is administered by Monmouthshire County Council. It sends two directly-elected members to the Senedd at Cardiff and one elected member to the UK parliament at Westminster. The county name is identical to that of the historic county, of which the current local authority covers the eastern three-fifths. Between 1974 and 1996, the county was known as Gwent, recalling the medieval kingdom which covered a similar area. The present county was formed under the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994, which came into effect in 1996. In his essay 'Changes in local government', in the fifth and final volume of the Gwent County History, Robert McCloy writes, "the local government of no county in the United Kingdom in the twentieth century was so transformed as that of Monmouthshire".
Monmouthshire, also formerly known as the County of Monmouth, was one of the thirteen historic counties of Wales in the south-east of Wales, on the border with England. Its area now corresponds approximately to the present principal areas of Monmouthshire, Blaenau Gwent, Newport and Torfaen, and those parts of Caerphilly and Cardiff east of the Rhymney River.
Brynmawr is a market town, community and electoral ward in Blaenau Gwent, Wales. The town, sometimes cited as the highest town in Wales, is situated at 1,250 to 1,500 feet above sea level at the head of the South Wales Valleys. It grew with the development of the coal mining and iron industries in the early 19th century. Until the reorganisation of local authorities in 1974, Brynmawr was administered as part of the county of Brecknockshire.
Crickhowell is a town and community in southeastern Powys, Wales, near Abergavenny, and is in the historic county of Brecknockshire.
Llanfoist is a village near Abergavenny, in Monmouthshire, Wales, in the community of Llanfoist Fawr. Llanfoist derives from Ffwyst, an early Christian Welsh saint, although the anglicised version of the church patron is Saint Faith. The population was 1,228 in 2011.
Sir Martyn John Dudley Lewis is a Welsh television news presenter and broadcast journalist who anchored ITN news bulletins between 1978 and 1986 and BBC News television shows from 1986 to 1999. Lewis attended Dalriada School and Trinity College, Dublin, before working as a freelance correspondent for BBC Northern Ireland and Harlech Television (HTV). He joined ITN in 1970 and headed its Northern Bureau from 1971 to 1978. Between 1978 and 1986, Lewis was an anchor for ITN's News at 5.45 and half-hour News at Ten bulletins, writing stories for the "And finally..." segment that features positive stories at the end of each News at Ten programme.
The National Eisteddfod of Wales is the largest of several eisteddfodau that are held annually, mostly in Wales. Its eight days of competitions and performances are considered the largest music and poetry festival in Europe. Competitors typically number 6,000 or more, and overall attendance generally exceeds 100,000 visitors, the highest recently being 186,000 attending the 2024 festival in Pontypridd. The 2018 Eisteddfod was held in Cardiff Bay with a fence-free 'Maes'. In 2020, the event was held virtually under the name AmGen; events were held over a one-week period.
King Henry VIII 3–19 School Abergavenny is an English-language All-Through School in the town of Abergavenny, in the county of Monmouthshire, Wales.
Abergavenny Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union club team based in Abergavenny. Today, Abergavenny RFC plays in the Welsh Rugby Union Division Two East league and is a feeder club for the Newport Gwent Dragons.
Rockfield is a small village in the community of Whitecastle, Monmouthshire, Southeast Wales. It is located beside the River Monnow, about 2 miles (3.2 km) north-west of Monmouth, at the junction of the B4233 to Abergavenny and the B4347 to Grosmont. Rockfield Studios is situated just south of the village.
Llanddewi Skirrid is a village in Monmouthshire, south east Wales, United Kingdom.
Blaenavon Rugby Football Club are a Welsh rugby union club based in the town of Blaenavon, South Wales. Blaenavon RFC is one of the older members of the Welsh Rugby Union founded in 1877 in the Iron and coal town of Blaenavon and is a feeder club for the Newport Gwent Dragons.
Monmouthshire Food Festival was an annual food festival held in Caldicot Castle in Monmouthshire
Welsh Cider and Perry Festival is an annual festival for cider and perry held at Caldicot Castle in Monmouthshire.
Peter Alan Fox OBE is a British Conservative politician who is the Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Transport and Rural Affairs in the Senedd. Fox was Leader of Monmouthshire County Council from 2008 until May 2021, when he was elected as a Member of the Senedd (MS) for the Monmouth constituency.
The cuisine of Monmouthshire is historically associated with Lady Augusta Hall, also known as Lady Llanover, who published one of the first Welsh cookery books, First Principles of Good Cookery (1867). The book uses a fictional Welsh hermit to give culinary advice to a visiting guest who is travelling though Wales.
Since 1934, Bristol has been the home of radio programmes transmitted throughout the UK and the world via BBC World Service. The BBC Radio & Music Production unit operates separately from the BBC Radio Bristol, which serves listeners in and around the city. The network production team makes programs for the UK and a global audience. The genre focus in Bristol includes a wide range of topics, such as food and farming, environmental journalism, natural history, investigative documentaries, human interest, Bristol R&M Production readings, drama, poetry, conversation, and political debates. In 2017, the team in Bristol began producing podcasts for the BBC. It has been located in Broadcasting House, Bristol since 1934, which is also home to the BBC Natural History Unit, BBC West, and BBC Radio Bristol, in addition to BBC Network Radio Bristol.
The Big Cheese Festival is an annual food festival held in July that was established in 2000 and is held in Caerphilly.
Abergavenny Town Hall is a municipal building located on Cross Street, Abergavenny in Monmouthshire, Wales. The town hall, which also houses the town's market, is a Grade II listed building.