Taste of London 2014

If you are a Londoner, you might have seen the posters advertising Taste of London everywhere. But I didn't need any persuading. I was totally there.

For non-Londoners, Taste is one of the biggest food festivals where loads of top restaurants (I MET MICHEL ROUX) and food producers come together and exhibit their dishes / products (which are all available to buy), which range from Scotch eggs to spicy Korean marinade to gourmet gin & tonic flavoured popcorn. 

It was awesome, I only wish the event was open longer...

Did I mention that I met Michel Roux?

So the day went something like this...

Pose with a Chinese dragon at the China food stall. Eat some tofu dessert (it was a bit weird, even for me).

Wander around the restaurant stalls...

This was Sixtyone Restaurant, serving macarons and some kind of chocolate dessert.

Crisp Dorset oyster, chicken caillette, shallot (again from Sixtyone Restaurant. And no, I don't know that a caillette is either...). 

Primose bakery cupcakes!

And an opportunity to make our own ice cream using liquid nitrogen from Custom Creams... 

The chefs are L'Anima posed for the paparazzi... (me).

Really cool Korean dudes serving us free kimchi burgers. 

The burgers in action.

I love you, free burger man.

I also went to listen to a talk about Green and Black's (okay, ulterior motive...they were giving out samples during the talk. So shoot me.)

I love you, Green & Black's man.

Oh, hang on.. who is that?

Is that.. Michel Roux??

Why, I think it might be!

Oh and I just casually got a photo with him. And then I instagrammed it, because you have to.

So actually what happened was he was serving at the La Gavroche stall (which I think is very humble of him to do so). I queued up and ordered the Pork Cheek and Belly Braised in Balvenie whisky sauce with Soft Polenta (£6). Well actually I was being a bit slow and shy when it got to my turn in the queue so he poked me.

Michel Roux poked me!!! He actually poked me! 

I love you Michel Roux!!!

My. I do feel like there's whole lotta love in this blog post.

And this is the pork belly I ordered (and for a fraction of the restaurant price too!)

Lastly, I went to the Taste of Thailand stall. There was a guy carving... I don't even know what to call them. Watermelon statues? Fruit objects? Anyway, it was really cool. He carved all of this from a single piece of fruit.

All in all, it was a super fun day. Lots of food to be sampled and eaten, lots of chefs to meet and a great way to discover new restaurants! (Or just try their food without having to go the whole hog).

See you next year!