Broadstairs Food Festival: A three-day feast for foodies
From Michelin-starred chefs to local artisan products
This year’s Broadstairs Food Festival is heating up with a full programme of award-winning exhibitors and a vibrant festival theatre schedule.
The annual event takes place in Broadstairs’s Victoria Gardens, with its unique cliff- top position, overlooking the beautiful Blue Flag beach of Viking Bay. (Entrance is free, assistance dogs only please.)
This three-day ‘feastival’ highlights Kent’s rich heritage of great food and drink, featuring carefully chosen and sustainability-focused growers and producers. Food-and-drink-lovers can explore a broad range of some 100 exhibitors, stock up on ingredients and take inspiration from industry experts.
In 2024, the Festival Theatre is bigger than ever. Expect free demonstrations from two of the county’s celebrated chefs making much-welcomed return visits: Michelin-starred chef Stephen Harris from The Sportsman, Seasalter, and Matt Sworder of the Corner House, Canterbury, are both appearing on Saturday 28th September. Other free events include a coffee masterclass with Ramsgate-based expert Daisy Rollo and a demonstration from Ryan Jacovides, creating small plates from Pomus in Margate, paired with a signature aperitivo.
Ticketed events include a Taste of Tuscany with Heritage Cheese/Il Palagiacco, Margate-based Mariachi’s tequila-tasting with a twist and a fun-filled blind wine-tasting with Alex and Jake, formerly of No.1 Oscar Road, Broadstairs.
Local pubs and restaurants will also be in festival spirit in the run-up to the weekend. On Wednesday 26th, listen to some amusing tales of the festival served with a cream tea at The Royal Albion Hotel, or enjoy a four-course gastro supper in the seaview dining room of the Charles Dickens pub. Twenty-Seven Harbour Street rounds off the town events with a six-course menu served on Friday 27th September. (These events are booked directly with the venues.)
Dining continues at the festival with two imaginative supper evenings, held in the Festival Theatre. ‘The Perfect Place to Grow’ is a training kitchen created to support 18- to 24-year-olds not in education. This innovative Margate-based charity will host a four-course menu, filled with passion, prepared and served by the trainees in collaboration with a guest chef.
(Friday 27 September, 7.30pm. Tickets £50. On sale at theperfectplacetogrow.org.uk)
The following day, The Foreign Embassy makes its debut at the festival. Known for its inventive one-off banquets in heritage locations from Dickens’s Bleak House to the Home for Smack Boys and the Italianate Glasshouse, each one brings people and appetites together around a single table; the menu remains a secret but will be based on local seafood and seasonal produce.
(Saturday 28 September, 8pm. Tickets £75. On sale at theforeignembassy.co.uk)
WHEN: Friday 27th to Sunday 29th September 2024, 10am-6pm
