Foodie paradise at Taste of London

Taste of London is a food festival that celebrates and showcases London’s best restaurants, chefs and food and drink brands. It takes places twice a year – a summer festival in Regent’s Park and a winter one in Tobacco Dock.

I went along to Taste of London last Saturday, on one of the hottest days of the year, to see what the fuss is all about.

The festival takes place over four days and attracts around 55,000 visitors. With 120 dishes to choose from, not to mention the various brand stalls, there is so much to get through! I love how it really is set up like a festival – although the portable toilets were much nicer! Some of the designs of the exhibiting stalls were gorgeous.

The Cook for Syria stall caught my eye as it has some famous names such as Melissa Hemsley who had put together recipes to raise money for the crisis in Syria. There’s a cook book that you can buy as well as lots of other ways to support #CookForSyria.

I decided to try the deep-fried ricotta-filled courgette flower with honey and mint by Laura Jackson. It was a staggering £6 but it was for charity… it was amazing! I could have eaten at least four though, one was most definitely not enough. All dishes at Taste of London cost between £3 and £6 each apart from each restaurant’s Icon Dish, which could cost more. All stalls took card and you could only use cash at the bars.

As well as purchasing small dishes from the participating restaurants, there were also some stalls giving away samples. This chocolate mousse cake from one of the 200 artisan producers was just divine!

It was so hot that day, that this Jude’s ice-cream van was a very welcome sight. And how CUTE is it?!

Of course no festival is complete without lots of places to get a drink or two. There were rum bars, cocktail bars, craft beer bars, champagne bars, gin bars and a prosecco van. There was also a Pimm’s bus, which had a bar on the upper deck.

As a prosecco lover, this of course was my favourite and once again, what a CUTE van!

I had read that the samphire pakora’s from Kricket were an absolute must so I had to try them. OH MY. They were sublime. They were served with a chilli garlic mayo on the side and drizzled with a date and tamarind chutney. I’ve not yet been to Kricket but I’m definitely going after tasting these, that’s for sure.

As well as all the food and drink stalls, there are a host of masterclasses and live demonstrations that you can attend at the Taste Theatre with well-known chefs. All the details of the chefs’ timetables are displayed on the Taste for London website so that you can plan which day you’d like to attend. This year some of the chefs at Taste of London included Tom Kerridge, Ollie Dabous, Neil Rankin, Ping Coombes, Jeremy Pang and Nathan Outlaw, to name a few.

And when you feel like you need a bit of a rest or even forty winks, you can grab a spot on the bright pink bean bags.

I really enjoyed Taste of London and I definitely want to attend the next one in November where I can hopefully pick up some tips for the festive season.

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