Where else would you see farm machinery, food and ferrets all in the same space?
Every year throughout the summer months rural areas gear up for their crowning moment, the highlight of the local calendar: the county or regional agricultural shows. Farmers and producers prepare their entries, craft artisans select items ready to put the best that a rural region has to offer on display. This is showcasing with lion-hearted pride. There are dozens of these shows happening throughout this fair isle of ours: that’s dozens of opportunities for foodies to explore via their palette all that a region has to offer. Because every agricultural and county show is a foodies festival in disguise.
Of course, we expect a certain line up at agricultural shows: livestock competitions, horse-jumping, dog shows and countryside displays, not to mention the odd spectacle of grown men doing something questionable with ferrets. But not everyone has considered the other, more gastronomic angle – these shows are foodie heaven, bringing together as they do the very best of locally grown, produced and prepared foods from the very finest of ingredients, using age-old traditions that local people are so proud to perpetuate (and to explain!)
With visiting local celebrity chefs and demonstrations by master butchers, cheese-makers, even bee keepers, you'll certainly pitck up a tip or two. Visit these shows and you can, quite literally, eat your way around Britain.
If you’re a foodie who likes to play chef yourself, it’s a fantastic opportunity to re-stock your larger with unusual ingredients. If, like me, you just like to taste and sample, enjoying the flavours, textures and appearance of local cheeses and locally made breads, head for the Food Hall
(some of the shows are big enough to have a food avenue) and stake out your spot! And, so that you can make a weekend of it, sampling the great wines, beers, ales and ciders all flowing in miraculous abundance
(hick!) without concern of having to travel too far back to your base, why not make a camping or touring weekend of it? Campsite Chatter’s directory of
Campsites Near Agricultural Shows has done the hard work for you, leaving you to concentrate on the most important bits -
yes, on the eating and drinking!
These
Devon County Show Campsites offer easy access to the single largest event each year in this fair county and, incidentally, a rather fabulous foodie festival to boot! Sample locally made breads, cheeses, meats and honeys, before washing it all down in ‘The Contented Cow’, the Devon County Show’s very own pop-up-pub where over 10,000 locally produced pints will be pulled during the 3 days of the show.
Head north for something rather different - why not visit the ‘Greatest Show on Earth’, pitching up on one of these
Campsites near the Royal Highland Show? Fling yourself into the characteristically Scottish larder assembled for the purposes of this great event: one of the most raved about agricultural shows in the UK. During the celebrations the coveted ‘OSCARS’ of the food and drink industry in Scotland are awarded and, be assured,
the excitement is building already.For something a little bit fruity, pitch your tent in one of these
Campsites near the Kent County Show where the Garden of England's bumper produce is showcased, and
(let’s just say it out loud),scoffed. Did you know that the Kent County Show features a ‘National Cherry and Soft Fruit Show’, a fervent celebration of fruit growing, production and eating?
Yummers… Pimms to wash that down?
Don’t mind if I do, thanks. Head east to one of these
Campsites near the Royal Norfolk Show for another great example of a Foodies Festival. With bars and food courts located around the show site, selling locally produced nosh of all varieties, refreshments aren’t hard to come by. There’s even a restaurant on site, run by the City College Hotel school with a full range of menus available from morning coffee ‘til post-four-course-dinner coffee at 10pm…
job done.So, to recap…pick your foodie festival; find a campsite using Campsite Chatter’s helpful pages; starve yourself for at least a month
(nothing drastic or life-threatening; just eat a little less each day over the course of the few weeks leading up to the start of the show – to make room, you understand), and then head for the Food Hall where you can appreciate the subtle differences in the ways that local breads and cheeses are made, meats are cured, fish is smoked, herbs are dried, fruit is preserved and beers, wines and ciders are brewed. And through this gastronomical explosion of flavours, you can come to understand a little more about the region you are visiting.
Sounds perfect…when are we going?Images courtesy of Naito8 (cider), Serge Bertasius (bread) and Zole4 (cheese) via www.freedigitalphotos.net
