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Blog: Rock Cakes
The festival season is upon us and, according to Andrew Harrison, it’s worth going for the food as much as the music...
To many, the very idea of going to a MUSIC festival for the food is a contradiction in terms. Who wants to spend days trogging round a muddy field for no greater reward than some soggy ‘Thai’ noodles? Is £7 an appropriate price for a baked potato with 12 baked beans on it?
The commonly held opinion that festivals are too commercial and populated by too many supermodels and weekend hippies is mainly held by people who’ve never actually been to a rock festival. Glastonbury, in particular, has a well-kept secret – as well as being a paradise of great bands, comedy, theatre, alternative therapies and Cybermen on stilts, it’s a food-lover’s nirvana.
Alongside the traditional vegetarian curry stalls, you can buy succulent hunks of Welsh venison, crepes stuffed with in-season local strawberries and cream, piping-hot seafood paella, plump organic burgers, every cake known to man, and magical creations woven with garlic and mushrooms that even Heston Blumenthal would be proud of.
The tasty vegetarian dishes at the Manic Organic café and the Tiny Tea Tent have turned those stalls into much-loved rendezvous for the festival’s demanding veggie contingent. For the omnivores, there are organic sausages and proper kebabs.
"Glastonbury is a food-lover’s nirvana."
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Then there’s the hearty Welsh pasty known as the Oggie, famed for its
capacity to sustain a festival-goer for 36 hours, and at least two
competing hog roast stalls. Even those noodle vendors (is there a
better name for a stall than Good Thai Dins?) seem to up their game.
I’ve been going to Glastonbury since 1986, first as a music fan and
later as a writer. Increasingly, the great performances I’ve seen are
equalled by the great food.
I still recall the curry bus from 1992 – a double-decker London
Routemaster bus that served vibrant, shrewdly spiced vegetarian masalas
as we sat on the top deck and watched festival-goers and their flaming
torches tramp through the night – and the Mexican breakfast of huevos
rancheros that brought me back to life
in the merciless heat of 1994.
The ostrich and cranberry pie from the Osgrow stall in 2002 was a
parcel of gamey magnificence that made my weekend, and The Real Sausage
Company’s furiously spicy pork and chilli banger had me hopping about
like a hen on a bonfire in 2005.
Last year was a muddy one…again. But the pies – always the subject of a
simmering battle for supremacy – hit the spot, and I declared a draw
between Square Pie’s lamb and rosemary and the coconutty Thai Pie from
PurePie. Sadly, I failed to locate the third challenger, Bristol’s
Pieminister, whose tarragon-based Chicken of Aragon was a highlight of
my Glastonbury 2005.
Another highlight was tartiflette originale from La Grande Bouffe –
melting potatoes cooked with white wine and bacon and topped with a
dense French sausage, which I ate raptly at midnight. The following
morning, on the enthusiastic recommendation of music-business legend
John Leckie, producer of everyone from The Stone Roses to Mark Owen, I
sought out the Goan Seafood Company, who catch their fish themselves
and bring it from Mevagissey in Cornwall. I tried the luxury breakfast
kedgeree and wished I didn’t have to go home by lunchtime.
Goan Seafood will be at The Big Chill and other festivals this summer,
as will Pure Pie, Real Sausage, La Grand Bouffe and the countless other
stalls that ensure that, one day, I will go to Glastonbury and not see
any bands at all.
Photo: Rich O'Brien
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