Sep 15 2008 by Ben Schofield, Liverpool Daily Post
Thousands of “foodies” thronged Sefton Park yesterday for the launch of Liverpool Food & Drink festival. The city’s gastronomic leaders laid on food sampling, cocktail tasting, cookery demonstrations and live music to celebrate Merseyside’s booming restaurant and bar scene. Organisers say yesterday’s 20,000-strong crowd was the biggest yet for the festival since it started in 2003.
Paul Askew, chef patron at Hope Street’s The London Carriageworks, did two cookery demonstrations. He said afterwards: “This is way beyond our wildest dreams. It really feels like this time we’ve got a real festival.”
Around 40 restaurants, bars and food companies showcased their products at the festival. Il Forno’s Vince Margiotta was seen making pizzas and Rob Preston, director of Alma de Cuba, mixed cocktails for the crowds. Mr Askew added: “It seems to have a different spirit this year. We all believe in the same thing – that it’s for the people of Liverpool, and not for commercial gain. “You can see there’s a real appetite for this. Food and drink has excelled in the city over the last 10 years. There’s such a mix of food and drink for all aspirations and tastes.”
Organisers had said this year’s festival, coming a decade after national newspapers and magazines condemned Liverpool as a food “blackspot”, was a chance for the city to prove its critics wrong.
Candice Fonseca, owner of Delifonseca, on Stanley Street, organised a wine-tasting master class and offered samples of olives and British cheeses. Her head chef Martin Cooper gave a class called “Food porn: Stop looking, start cooking” aimed at encouraging people to put into practice what they see on TV cookery shows. She said: “This has blown everything out of the water – surpassed all our expectations.”
The first 1,000 foodies through the gates were given free goodie-bags containing fruit juice, Green and Blacks chocolate and a tin of Jacobs biscuits. They were all gone just 50 minutes after the gates opened. Joel Jelen, a spokesperson for the festival, added: “This is a celebration of where Liverpool is now. It’s becoming a restaurant hotspot – otherwise all these people wouldn’t be here.”
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