Tasty tourism award for Thame Food Festival

THAME Food Festival, which this year attracted over 20,000 people to the town, has earned a Bronze Award in The Beautiful South Awards 2015.

Lotte Duncan (L-centre) and Alison Isherwood, with the other Bronze winner, Electric Woods – Robin Hill Country Park, Isle of Wight (Left)

At a glittering award ceremony in Brighton on Wednesday evening, December 2, a delighted Lotte Duncan and Alison Isherwood collected the award on behalf of everyone involved in the event that after just six years since its inception, has become the biggest, free food festival in country.

Commenting on the awards, Nigel Smith, CEO of Tourism South East (pictured right), said, “It was a fantastic evening at the Grand Hotel and a real privilege to be in the company of so many dedicated and passionate tourism businesses. The excellent quality of facilities, service and approach makes our role of promoting the South East so much easier and is one of the main reasons why we are the most popular UK tourist region outside London.”

Thame Food Festival benefits good causes

Not only does the Thame Food Festival showcase the town to thousands of visitors,  it is a not-for-profit organisation and raises funds for local good causes and charities, and this year raised a total of £3,420.

Alison Isherwood, Food Festival Administrator, said: “The following organisations have benefited and we would like to thank our visitors, sponsors, directors and volunteers who came and helped in the run up, and on the day. Everyone was responsible for contributing towards the donations.”

The Thame ATC (Air Training Corp) who transported equipment from the equipment bank and were responsible for putting out tables, chairs etc £250, Thame Lions Stall at event £785, Thame Rotary Club Stall at event £700, Lions and Rotary who stewarded the stallholders’ car park £500, Thame Foodbank from proceeds of  The Big Thame Bake £500 and the Belazu Foundation Pop-up restaurant in Christchurch £685 – a grand total of £3420.

Master Chef winner, Natalie Coleman with some young Thame cooks at the Thame Food Festival

In a letter to Thame Food Festival and The Big Thame Bake, John Hulett, Trustee of Sharing Life Trust wrote: “Thank you so much for thinking of us. This is a very welcome donation indeed which we can use towards the cost of our ‘Community Christmas in a Box’ project which we are running for the third year.”

The Lions and Rotary Club, both based in Thame have been involved with the Festival for a number of years, and they raise money throughout the year for many local causes. Money raised from both their stalls and the producers’ car park on the Festival day, helped The Rotary Club support their chosen charities – the Citizen’s Advice Bureau and Medical Detection Dogs and The Multiple Sclerosis Centre at Wendover.

The Thame Lions Club organise an annual Pantomime trip to the Thame Players theatre, followed by a tea party for approximately 60 elderly and underprivileged people, and the money they raised on the day helped towards making this possible.

“The Thame Food Festival relies on the help of so many people to make it the success it is and I’d like to say a big thank you to them all,” said Lotte Duncan, Patron and Director of the Thame Food Festival. “We are hugely grateful to all the chefs who give their time for nothing to come to Thame, the directors who provide their input and expertise, the new foodie force of volunteers helping out on the day, Jane Hornby who did a wonderful job running the Big Thame Bake and of course our hard-working organiser, Alison Isherwood.  Thank you to everyone – it’s a true team effort,”

The Thame Food Festival is a community event run by the community for the community.  For more details, or to get involved by sponsoring or supporting next year’s festival, visit: www.thamefoodfestival.co.uk