Foodies Festival, Syon Park

A beautiful sunny May morning and I had a date with ALL the food.  Today was the first of three days of the Foodie Festival at Syon Park so smothered myself with sun screen and headed over to the park to see what foodie delights awaited...

If you've never been to Syon Park, it's a real gem of a place - the big open green space smack bang in the middle of Isleworth somehow feels like you're in the middle of the countryside even though Heathrow airport is only about 7 miles away.  Wafts of BBQ hit me before I even got to the road leading through the park so I quickened my pace to get to the food!

I'll just warn you now; there are quite a few photos, all of my favourite bits, and I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed seeing everything in real life!

There were not one but two stalls with epic amounts of meat being grilled, both right next to each other - Boy Meats Grill with ridiculous hunks of meat and Flamin' Rooster with gorgeous looking ribs and wings...

There were drinks of all kinds, pop up bars and samples galore (thanks, teapigs for a full sized super refreshing matcha tea drink!)

I spent a little while in the demonstration tent (they also had drinks and baking demonstrations in other tents) and really wish I'd leapt up to try the salad they made when they asked for volunteers!!!

After the cooking demonstration I wandered around the stalls on a foodie cloud nine - fudge, bread, cakes, meat, every type of sauce under the sun, wine...

I couldn't help but dive for my purse when I saw these beauties.  How could I resist not taking some champagne and strawberry, salted caramel, or banoffee macarons from Dimkin's Patisserie home with me?!

Dotted around the festival were food stalls and vans with flavours and food from every nook and cranny of the world...

And hold on a minute...these massive platters of salad, veg and pickles and that chicken all looked very familiar!  I'm pretty sure I had a gorgeous wrap from World Food when I was in Exeter!  The huge queue proved just how delicious and filling the wraps were!

And then...be still my gyoza loving heart...I found the Ugly Dumplings stall.  I make no secret of the massive crush I have on dumplings and when I saw on Twitter that my one of my favourite foods would be at the festival I couldn't wait to try them.  I was not disappointed and have to say that they are probably some of the best dumplings I've ever had, cooked my favourite way with a little frying and a little steaming.  There were five different types (check out their website for what they have to offer) and I can highly recommend, well, all of them but the spinach and tofu one was my favourite.

And if things couldn't get any better, I stumbled upon the Harry Brompton's tent so the obvious thing to do was get one of their alcoholic iced teas, have a seat and get stuck in!

Feeling happy, well fed, a little sun-kissed and BBQ-scented I did a final lap of the festival to make sure I hadn't missed anything and was about the make my way home when I saw the cider stall.  I love cider probably as much as I love dumplings so thought it would be rude to leave without having some proper Somerset cider, especially when it was served like this...

Foodies Festival
There are festivals across the country up until 4th September 2016 - be sure to check if there's one near you!