Organic Food Festival
The Organic Food Festival is taking place in Glasgow this weekend.
The Organic Food Festival is the first to take place away from the Soil Association’s home city of Bristol. Split between two Glasgow venues, the Old Fruitmarket and Glasgow Metropolitan College, the event is a celebration of all things organic. It includes a marketplace of over 50 stalls selling and promoting food, drink, textiles and skincare. You’ll be able to get lots of information about organic food and why it’s better for you, as well as picking up some fantastic bargains.
For 2 pounds entry fee you get access to a whole range of organic foods sold on over 50 stalls. A lot of them offer free tasters and it is possible to skip a meal by just trying everything. I bought cheese from the Connage Highland Dairy and the Summer Isle Foods company who specialise in smoded fish and cheese. It was also very hard to resist buying some beers from the Black Isle Brewery and I ended up getting one each of Red Kite, Yellowhammer, Blonde, Scotch Ale, Porter and Wheat Beer. Ardna Mushrooms were selling mushrooms:
The newly formed company of Ardnamushrooms in Strontian grows organic, gourmet edible fungi on woody substrates in a climate controlled container and sells to hotels and restaurants, primarily in Lochaber. Currently the business is in the stage of setting up the infrastructure and starting to establish links with hoteliers and chefs in the region.
Ardnamushrooms uses a recently-developed system for growing saprophytic fungi. The system was developed by Richard Edwards of Humungus Fungus and is being used to grow shiitake mushrooms in Skye and Mull. Mr. Edwards is providing both technical support and the inoculated grain.
Oak shavings (60%) and hardwood chips (34%)are mixed with organic bran (5%) and agricultural gypsum (1%), put into polythene bags, sterilized in an autoclave (a large pressure cooker), mixed with inoculated grain, incubated for a few weeks and then placed in a growing room where the fungi grow out of the ‘blocks’.
that tasted really nice. Interesting idea.