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April
2007
A
rhubarb-free zone!
The Big Little Fruit
Campaign starts its year by urging the media to look beyond rhubarb, think
outside the strawberry box and push the seasonal envelope: In other words,
to focus on British culinary fruit!
Yorkshire rhubarb is
rightly celebrated in due season, as are strawberries and seasonal veg such
as asparagus and Jersey Royal potatoes, but many British culinary fruits go
unregarded.
These last, Big
Little Fruit Campaign highlights wherever possible: culinary fruits that
were BIG in our past, but that now occupy only a LITTLE place
in our diets.
Would you know a
myrobalan from a mirabelle? Can you say why ‘bullace’ sounds rude, but
isn’t? And have you ever put a tummelberry in your tum? All three fruits
need to be revived and celebrated, along with numerous others that the cooks
of the past valued but are no longer grown, or that simply go unharvested in
the hedgerows and pick-your-own farms of the UK.
2007 will see the
Big Little Fruit message reaching the public in various ways, as campaign
founder Debbie Hearn cooks, talks and tastes her way around food festivals
and other events.
2007 launch 12.30
pm Sunday 27 May
Join Debbie Hearn to
taste a selection of fruit-based products at Food at The Fringe,
Victoria Park, Newbury (part of the Newbury Fringe Festival
www.newburyfringefestival.org )
Fresh fruit tastes
will be offered at the Ludlow Marches and Abergavenny Food Festivals later
in the season. The Big Little Fruit website gives details of further events:
www.biglittlefruit.co.uk
More…
The Big Little Fruit
Campaign was founded in 2005 by Debbie Hearn, a passionate advocate of
fresh, seasonal British foods. As a food writer, Debbie specialises in fruit
and she judged the Tastiest Apple at the National Fruit Show in 2006. She is
a member of the Guild of Food Writers.
You can read about
her long-term vision for the future of British culinary fruit at the Big
Little Fruit website, but first notice these pats on the back for those who
are already doing good things:
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Fruit farms such as Boyce’s at Manstree in Devon, which has a wide range
of cane fruits, and specialist producers such as The Somerset Cider Brandy
Company, which makes high-quality products from the fruits that flourish
at Burrow Hill.
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Farmers’ markets whose local sourcing policies provide real commercial
opportunities for small-scale fruit farmers and food producers whose
products contain culinary fruits.
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Waitrose, whose Cooks’ Ingredients range offers seasonal fruits selected
for their cooking properties, including the late-season pear, ‘Glou
Morceau’.
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The media: They have a crucial role to play in highlighting areas of our
food culture that the Great British public would otherwise miss. And
that’s not rhubarb!
Contact Debbie
Hearn: 34 Greenacres, Woolton Hill, Newbury, Berkshire, RG20 9TA.
Tel: 01635 255383.
Email:
debbie.hearn@spudbash.co.uk
Website address:
www.spudbash.co.uk
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