An unfortunate festival clash with Bestival this year meant that I couldn’t be in two places at once and so I handed the responsibility of heading down the road to Harvest at Jimmy’s to my mum(!) Here’s what she had to say:
“Having attended Harvest at Jimmy’s in 2009 this year’s festival looked set to build on the success of the firmly family-oriented event in a big way and what a transformation!! This festival has gone from strength to strength, luring the likes of The Divine Comedy, Eliza Doolittle and Turin Brakes to name but a few artists from the music world , and for food fanatics the festival boasted appareances from Italian Chef Gennaro Contaldo, family cook Mary Berry and the ever popular and charismatic James Martin.
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Every aspect of this festival is aimed at the family market, except for maybe one crucial point, the ticket price, which was a little steep for many families to be able to attend. Whilst £100 might seem fairly reasonable in comparison to the likes of the big-hitters Glastonbury, Reading/Leeds, Big Chill, Bestival and so on, for 2 days it’s still pricey.
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Nevertheless the festival still experienced it’s biggest and busiest year yet with a sizeable 20,000 in attendance. People couldnt get enough of the various chefs demonstrations and made sure they got there early enough to get a good view. A few rows of straw bales would have been a nice touch for the older crowd to sit on although it was a massive plus to have the large screen to view if you couldnt get a good spot.
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Unfortunately the same couldnt be said for the music area, this would have benefitted from the same idea; to have such a promising lineup of music and not be able to see them at times was slightly disappointing. Children were extremely well catered for, with tents and events going on all day in the childrens area. The choice of food available to buy was imaginative, tasty and from all four corners of the world. The only problem being, what to choose!!! From “Chilli Gone Barmey” to “Churros & Chocolate”, you name it, it was probably there.
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For the slightly more weight conscious amongst us! (that’ll be me then) we headed for the Salad Days sign, indulging in a box of salad, salsa, couscous and grilled salmon… devine!! An hour or so later and we headed for the ice cream van!!! After being spoilt for choice with some wonderful and unusual choices I settled for rum and ginger and my friend going for the rhubarb crumble!! After some hours of eating, drinking, walking, and entertainment we found ourselves in need of a little quiet/down time and where better to head for than Caelas Garden for a cuppa!!
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Some of the highlights of our day was watching the very entertaining James Martin, not just a chef, but quite a comedian too, he prepared four different dishes all of which looked and smelt delicious all whilst interacting with the crowd. Gennaro Contaldo was another chef with crowd appeal. Jamie Oliver (friends of organiser Jimmy Doherty) made an appearance and then ventured into the crowd to allow tasting of Gennaros dish. It was lovely to see the actress Fay Ripley also enjoying the event with her family and good to see Jimmy himself out and about amongst the crowds.
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The music throughout the weekend was extremely well received from the smaller, up-and-comers such as Tom Odell to the likes of The Divine Comedy. Rounding off the Saturday evening was the ever-elegant Eliza Doolittle. The Sunday saw The Kooks make an exclusive headline appearance along with Fat Freddy’s Drop, Turin Brakes and Charlie Simpson.“
Words: Stephanie Cook.
