The fifth British Food Fortnight which took place from 23rd September to 8th October 2006 was the biggest national celebration EVER of the diverse and delicious range of food that Britain produces. The event was sponsored by Aramark, Budgens, Londis and Nationwide and featured the Pyrex Cooking Challenge for schools.

The theme of this year’s event ‘Are you Cooking it?’ was embraced by retailers, caterers and schools all of whom organised a myriad of events and promotions across the country. Highlights include:

More promotions in shops than ever before… 2,200 Budgens and Londis stores, 300 delicatessens, independents, farm shops and farmers markets offered a mass of promotions and tastings tempting the public to use British seasonal ingredients when cooking at home. Early reports suggest that footfall in participating shops was up at least 25% during the Fortnight and sales of products offered for tastings increased a staggering 50%. And for the first time, three of the biggest supermarket chains all ran British promotions during the event.

Catering sector takes centre stage for the first time… Five of the largest food service groups, led by ARAMARK, three major pub groups and all the chef associations put British food on thousands of menus in pubs, restaurants, hospitals and staff canteens. Even one of the most famous Indian restaurants in London got in on the act using all British ingredients in its dishes.

Beating Jamie Oliver to it…Jamie Oliver and the Government are starting to call for schools to offer cookery lessons but British Food Fortnight is already leading the way. 26,000 schools were provided with the first ever guide to including cookery within the curriculum in the build-up to the event. As a result thousands of children were given cooking lessons during the Fortnight. In an innovative move, organisations representing over 3,000 chefs teamed up with schools to offer their services in the classroom and to help teachers organise practical cookery activities. The aim is to emulate the French who regularly send chefs into schools to teach children about their national cuisine.

Competitive spirit encourages children to cook…a myriad of cooking competitions were held during the Fortnight. Budgens and Londis stores teamed up with local schools for a competition to design a ‘Chef’s Hat’ featuring local produce; ARAMARK organised a ‘Create a Bramley Apple Recipe’ to inspire school children to get cooking. And all schools were invited to enter the Pyrex Cooking Challenge to find the school that incorporates cookery within the curriculum in the most innovative and imaginative way. The winner will be announced mid-November.

Audience reach…this year’s British Food Fortnight reached an unprecedented number of the public. Thousands of events were held across the country with food festivals in the East Midlands, West Sussex, Lincolnshire, Malvern, Yorkshire, Bath, Devon, Cornwall and Bath; welly walks; cookery demonstrations; foraging forays and special harvest festival celebrations. And in media, Terry Wogan, Jonathon Ross, the World Tonight, the Archers, GMTV, Saturday Kitchen and Saturday Cooks and every national newspaper all extolled the event resulting in preliminary figures suggesting a staggering audience reach of 250 million.

Alexia Robinson, organiser of British Food Fortnight comments: “Every year British Food Fortnight gets bigger and more successful. It gives retailers and caterers a commercial incentive to stock British food thereby making it more accessible to the public and it inspires schools to include it within their curriculum teaching.

“Organisations representing 43,820 shops, 11,560 pubs, 43,300 restaurants, 5,800 chefs; tourism outlets receiving 16 million visitors and groups representing ¼ million volunteers now participate in the event each year. It is the only event bringing all these groups together. With this show of support British Food Fortnight is well placed to change the eating habits of the nation!”

British Food Fortnight 2007 takes place 22nd September to 7th October 2007.
For further information see www.britishfoodfortnight.co.uk