ABERGAVENNY FOOD FESTIVAL GWYL FŴYD Y FENNI 2012 : Children's events

Knitted fruity hats at the 2011 Festival

Children's events at the 2012 Festival

With a grow your own pizza competition, great prizes and top chefs dropping by, this is the most exciting year yet for the Food Academy. Young festival goers can come to the castle area to experiment with cooking and experience the joy and magic of preparing and eating food they've cooked themselves. From rolling out their own pasta & meatballs to finding out what the welsh speciality 'Bara Brith' actually means, we've got some brilliant activities lined up. Eating is an important shared family event, the most important event of the day, and the children's events spread the joy of cooking and show that it can be great fun. As well as the rolling workshops from the extremely talented Jethro Carr of the Kitchen Academy, (kitchenacademy.co.uk) there are also two award winning guest chefs this year. Richard Bertinet, of The Bertinet Kitchen & Bakery in Bath (bertinet.com) will be showing children how to make a smoked fish chowder and Alex Mackay, Patron of the charity Kids Cookery School (thekidscookeryschool.co.uk) will be showing us how to cook his 'Everyway Burgers' – he'll be taking a basic burger recipe and spicing it up with orange zest or cinnamon.

Kitchen Academy Interactive Workshops

Saturday 15 & Sunday 16 September
10.30 – 11.30am	Bara Brith no bake cheese cake
12.00 – 1.00pm	Welsh sushi
2.00 – 3.00pm	Guest Chef: Saturday Richard Bertinet; Sunday Alex Mackay
3.30 – 4.30pm	Lamb meatballs & hand-made pasta

Children can take part in the Food Academy free of charge on a first-come, first-served basis and must be accompanied by an adult.

Grow your own pizza competition

The grand finale of the Food Academy's Grow your Own Pizza competition for local secondary schools will take place in the main Market Hall on Sunday morning. Not only have students had to come up with a unique Welsh take on a pizza they have also had to grow as many ingredients for it as possible, such as garlic, tomatoes and basil. Chef Cyrus Todiwala, a regular on the BBC's Saturday Kitchen, will crown the winners who will receive a luxury break for a family of four at theCeltic Manor Resort (celtic-manor.com).

It will include a two night stay at the five star hotel including full Welsh breakfast, dinner each evening, a chance to try out spectacular Adventure Golf and the exhilarating Forest Jump treetop adventure plus a choice of supervised children's activities, giving Mum and Dad a chance to relax, unwind and enjoy the luxurious spa.

All participants will also receive a goody bag with cookery essentials from the wonderful Cooks Galley in Abergavenny and a copy of Alex Mackay's new cookbook Everybody Everyday.

The 2013 Abergavenny Food Festival will take place over the weekend of the 21st and 22nd September!

Sign up to our e-news bulletins and win a luxury break for two at the 5-star Celtic Manor Resort

Sign up and stay up to date with Festival news with our e.news bulletins and you'll have the chance of winning a gourmet break for two at the five-star Celtic Manor Resort in South Wales. Terms and conditions apply. Prize is a one-night stay with dinner and afternoon tea for two people sharing a bedroom. Dinner includes one bottle of house wine and excludes all other beverages. The winner will be randomly selected in December 2012. The prize must be taken by November 2013.