FOOD AND GARDEN ZONE & BROCKWELL BAKE

FULL SCHEDULE DOWNLOAD HERE

Outdoor cooking

Every year we hope to add something different. Last year, despite the weather, we had a lovely garden zone. The centre-piece of the event was the bread baking competition which displayed some phenomenal talent. The sheer look of the display was enough to hold people in great anticipation of the results. We hope to do the same this year but even bigger.

• Cob building is a fun activity that has taken off with environmentalists and practitioners of outdoor cooking the world over. These ovens are a British tradition. We hope to build a cob oven on the day and fire it up. For those who want to get a little sticky - bring your wellies!

• Phillip King will be returning after 2 years to show you his work on solar cooking - using sustainably sourced materials to construct a DIY reflector oven. These ovens were pioneered in Africa and the Mediterranean. There will be workshops on the day.

Plants & Composting

Last year, in collaboration with South London Permaculture, Peter Turski and PassionFlower built a facade of a house with a garden in front. The walkway along the back allowed for top viewing of the sedum roof that spanned either side of the door.

• Return of the ‘house’ display, bigger, with many more plants and hopefully with SLP's help, more (and more varied) edibles.
• Creating a garden space by guerilla gardening certain parts of the zone.
• Lydsay Wayman from WRAP will run a short composting workshop, so keep a lookout on the schedule.

• We also like to display people's wares from their allotments and organisations like Food up Front will be hosting a competition and receiving membership. The categories are as follows: the biggest, the most beautiful, the sexiest, and the rudest.
  

Gardening and Food preparation

With confirmation Transition Town Brixton are setting up an outdoor kitchen for those who want to try some cooking. The theme is family and heritage value, so if anyone out there wants a platform on a dais then give Sarah a shout on cannon_sarah@hotmail.com and she will schedule you into the Cookers and Eaters kitchen area. Also on the agenda:

• Wild food walks,
• Bees
• Good old home cooking to carry the day through.

Kitchen Buddy & Theresa Webb will be down giving us an example of compassionate food preparation - there may be some real chocolate on the go. Highlights include:

• An invisible food walk lead by Ceri Buck to include foraging around Brockwell Park for elderberries for jam & tea-making herbs. These in turn will be brought back to the food & garden area where we will be preparing jam fruit from elderberry and apples on a rocket stove, with mini jam-jar samplers for people to take away, and herb tea.

• Kids activities including butter-making and elderberry ink doodling. See the Kids zone for more information on the craft table. The day will end with a free food sitting for 50 people with entertainment including impromtu music and storytelling.

Volunteers will be free to engage in some hands-on practical gardening with maybe a few unusual workshops to whet the appetite. Don't be surprised to find anything from home-brewing to herbal medicine.

Farmers market and Boot Fair

These stalls will be strictly ethical and will include meat, bread and vegetables. Over time we’d like to create an urban nature oasis with an organic food display and a few animals. Despite our petition to city farms we may have to wait a little while longer. The food on sale will include your very own local scrumpy.

Everything else

There will also be the opportunity to hear political views surrounding food issues and land access. Our speaker’s corner features:

• Rebeka Bloom from HemPower will discuss and sell her hemp products
• Atif from Zaytoun down willl hopefully speak about the Palestinian crisis and the first Fairtrade organicially certified olive oil.

Also pencilled in is:

• A boot fair, freecycle and Give and Take marquee.
• On sale and on display will be a variety of plants as well as books from Permanent Publications who have kindly donated a host of books for the grand raffle.
• And, of course, no visit to Brockwell park would be complete without taking a trip to the fantastic greenhouses.

Finally, we are particularly looking for contributions on the theme of food and garden from the art world, whether you see yourself as a photographer, painter or poet. The coordinator would very much like to see your work and can be contacted direct on eight.merlyn@virgin.net. On top of this anyone who would like to exhibit their project should contact the website direct. Priority of viewing will be given to those who actively engage in working towards a greener London. All contributors and volunteers will be rewarded with a meal voucher.

The 2nd BROCKWELL BAKE 'real baking' event

Following last year's success the Brockwell Bake event returns to the Food and Garden Zone with extra added ingredients! Our event will be working with and supporting the Traditional CornMillers Guild and the Real Bread Campaign.

• A full afternoon's programme of illustrated talks, dicussions and demos relating to baking including a history and analysis of "Un-Real Bread" from leading bakers, millers and botanical archaeologist and wheat grower, John Letts of the Oxford Bread Group and demonstration of baking with rye flour. More talks info here
  
  
• The baking competition for bakery baked and home (and outdoor) baked items with chair of judges John Downes known as "the godfather of the sourdough baking renaissance in Australia". For competition classes and the entry form check here
  
  
• a "Bread Barter Picnic" with all invited to bring and share their home baked goodies and ingredients to eat with (plus tuck in to the bakery competition entries after the judging)
  
  
• "Real Flour Stall" with a great selection of flours available to buy from members of the Traditional CornMillers Guild ground without fossil fuel energy in water or wind powered mills between stone millstones spreading the most nutritous elements of the grain berry throughout the flour unlike modern roller milling.

For further information on the Brockwell Bake please check http://www.brockwell-bake.org.uk/