feast foodies festival 2014 at battersea park.

last weekend i headed over to london once more for a few foodie filled days with my old school pal grace. on the saturday, this involved checking out the feast foodies festival at battersea park. the weather was kind and the sun shone as we had a lovely walk across the river from south kensington tube station. we also managed to enter at the totally wrong end of the park, but that didn't seem to matter since it was sunny. besides, i needed the exercise.

for us, the festival began with an idle walk around the stalls to see what we fancied first. anyone who has been to a foodie event will know, you have to make executive decisions in order to try everything you want. 

with the sound of live music in the background, we browsed stalls full of everything from dim sum to donuts and cheese to chocolate cake. there is quite literally something for everyone, of all ages, from vegans to meat worshippers, from those who love savoury to the sweetest of teeth. 

two people could quite literally have two different days at a food festival; the cheese and wine lovers could sample a variety of cheese, buy their favourite crackers and head to the wine tasting workshop, whilst a family could enjoy the live music, children's cookery workshops and enjoy gourmet burgers and thirstquenching smoothies.

we stumbled across the papa pitta stall and the first decision was made; a grilled halloumi wrap. sensibly we shared one between us, in order to broaden our options. 

this was everything street food should be. albeit rather messy to eat, i gobbled up the squeaky grilled halloumi with lashings of sauce with zings of mint in a fresh but crunchy pitta.

with happy maki and dim sum corner offering their wares, our will power was at full capacity avoiding anything sushi related or similar, as we had a table booked at sticks n sushi that evening. look how good they looked though. yes that is a whole chilli!

see anything you'd have tried yet? see i told you there was something for everyone. we zig zigged through stalls of organic oils, oysters and olives and suddenly something which looked just our cup of tea. a vintage feast of afternoon tea, cakes and scones. 

based in london, vintage feast host tea parties, summer picnics, afternoon teas and even loan out vintage crockery and props. on this occasion, they were serving up scrumptious cakes (menu quote: a massive slice), neverending tea and homemade scones with a dollop of clotted cream and strawberry jam. we went for tea and scones in higgledy piggledy, but very pretty, teacups, saucers and plates. delish!

i also saw a few familiar faces from businesses who have featured on the blog before; hello fresh the meal box company and field & flower who produce and deliver high quality meat and accompaniments to your door. 

if you'd like to try for yourself, i actually have a £20 off hello fresh discount code valid for 2014. simply enter NER3EE to try a 3 meal box for around £19.

whilst we waited for the cake and bakes demonstration we'd registered for, we tried a little sample of montano, an organic italian cider. next thing, we had been enticed by the beautiful apple taste and light fizziness akin to prosecco. 

picking up a chilled 600ml bottle and fancy branded cups for just £5, the reason the cider has such a juicy taste and light fizz is because your palette isn't skewed by the usual sulphites found in many alcoholic drinks. 

we managed to nab some giant deckchairs too - bonus! heading over to the cake and bakes tent, we were there just in time for the 3pm botanical chocolates demonstration with fiona sciotti of sciotti chocolates in north lincolnshire. i didn't not what to expect except, well, chocolate. there had better be samples...

fiona was a fun and friendly character who chatted through her recipes whilst making us all laugh and even letting lucky members of the audience lick the spoon. a very talented and award winning chocolatier, fiona and her husband make chocolates with unique flavours which often involved foraging for ingredients from the fruits, herbs and flowers of the english countryside, as well as local cream, honey and fruit.

fiona made four chocolates; raspberry and white chocolate with pink peppercorns, goat's cheese and fig with a 50/50 mix of dark and milk, a water based cocktail chocolate made from harry bromptons alcholic iced tea and a chocolate made with biscuit butter from one of the stalls. and yippe - there were samples! i think the latter was my favourite, closely followed by the goat's cheese. the flavours really worked.

i couldn't resist stopping by the stall on the way out just to pick up a bar - i went with salted pistachio white chocolate. oh yes. 

you can see a few of my other foodie treats to myself over on my instagram. i picked up some pistachio cream from the festival as well as splurging at japan centre later on. can't wait to share with you what i'm going to make.

i always wish i could go back in time and write foodie event posts before they happen - no good you reading this now and not being about to go. find out more about the nationwide foodies festivals here or follow @foodiesfestival on twitter. 

until next year!

note: we paid for our own entry and purchases however we did overindulge on the samples. all opinions are honest and my own.