Jamie & Hugh name and shame the UK a 'nation of meat worshipers' @Taste of Christmas 2011 - London

Sorry if you crick your neck viewing the video clip but I couldn't find a way to rotate it.

Taste Festivals put on tri-annual events in Brighton, Oxford and our glorious capital...London. In the past, I'd avoid these 'mainstream' events like the plague but I figured we are all in this together and you can't know what you don't know and if you don't mix then perhaps you miss out on an opportunity to share AND learn...maybe..(shrugs).



I read non-vegan cookbooks for inspiration, just as I look to different cultures and history book and even sci-fi to keep my mind open to new ideas.  My excitement was akin to opening up a stiff, new book with only the merest hint of what it may contain.

The main reason for buying a ticket to, what I considered afterwards, as I glided back to London Bridge on the DLR, is actually me paying to see lots of retailers in order to buy their products (?!)...that aside (can't get my head around my being drawn into the marketing of that concept!), the main reason was to see Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall who has recently started banging on (in a good way) about veg (Hello Mr F-W - welcome to our world).  It is also the effect of hero worshipping TV, when you watch someone on the box with more frequency than you visit your mother, and then proceed to place the object of your attention higher than yourself.  It's like this, he's doing, I'm watching.  Therefore (according to my logic) he is better than me (hey, I never said I was perfect..or sane!).  That said, both Hugh & Jamie seem thoroughly nice chaps and, evidently.....as I stood as close as I could get to the stage (behind a rather flatulent (really!) camera man)..... a bit of a laugh.

Anyhoo, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall........(who at the moment, I have to be honest is perplexing me...Zac Braff or Gary Barlow he ain't but, since he cut his hair and embraced the veggie more, I have developed a wee bit of a crush on him...despite myself..I tried to stop)..... and Jamie Oliver spoke about the UK playing too much homage to eating animals and they actually said our bodies weren't meant for it and the planet cannot cope with it.  (watch the video snip above) Of course, to'greenies' 'veggies' and 'vegans'  Dr Oz and many eminent scientists present and past, this comes as not a shock.  However, I am excited to see the pendulum starting to swing the other way.  The Truth will out, right!

The Festival was mostly a let down for me, all chocolate, booze and meat.  But there are always silver, and sometimes golden linings to any cloud.  So despite some absolute idiot on a curry paste stall telling me something was vegan that had turkey in (so angry...arse is too mild a word for him...but all the more highlights the need for more education in that respect...or a thump)!  Being ripped off by a train fare hiked up FOUR times just because I travelled in peak hour (disgusted!) and there being no vegan options at the pop-up restaurants (hungry!).  I did get to taste the new kid on the block - BLACK garlic. So sweet, chewy and delectable! Also to see the one and only vegan foodstuff on exhibit was four rows deep (jazz hands, goon face).  Best of all Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall made his cooking demonstration ALL ABOUT VEGGIES!  though he did seem to feel like he had to keep justifying it and mentioning meat.  'Come on hunky (?!) Hugh, you now know the ambrosia of vegan fayre and it's time to come out of the closet/meat chiller'.  Finally, it made me so much more confident about my skills, knowledge and abilities as a cook and that was worth the extortionate train fare and the irritating fact that I won two (non-refundable) tickets to the show AFTER I'd purchased my ticket online.

the lads, both sporting the 'left hand on the hip and right hand clutching microphone' stance.

Mr Jamie 'bed hair' Oliver

Black garlic...yum, like candy

Vegan baking chick the crowd couldn't get enough of.

Posh Paraphernalia - cute pinnies for sale

Hugh, extolling the virtues of the mighty kale  - God luv 'im.

Big Hugh and little Hugh

I guess all in all, despite the fact I could have flown to Barcelona cheaper, I only purchased a black garlic and a mediocre vegan chocolate, and I didn't get anything substantial to eat other than the said chocolate and a handful of chilied seeds..... it was an ok day.  I believe disease, obesity and the UK's burgeoning love affair with ingredients is actually beginning to open up a track into 'mainstream' consciousness, and one day I'll be spoilt for choice with the number of veggie/vegan Taste Festivals to attend and, perhaps, even better (here comes a life goal) I'll even be doing cooking demos...now that would be fun.

p.s  Sorry the pics are not that great.  Thankfully, I know you are always forgiving and kind.   x