Over 100 Irish food and drinks producers will showcase their products at this year's Bloom festival, which will take place at the Phoenix Park, Dublin from 30 May – 3 June, 2019.
The Food Village will host the producers, allowing visitors to sample and take home premium Irish-produced food and drinks from an abundance of stalls and meet the people who make them, Bord Bia outlined in a statement.
The Food Market will feature 68 smaller scale Irish producers of farmhouse cheeses, preserves, baked goods, confectionary, juices and much more; the Love Irish Food pavilion will feature up to 15 stalls belonging to their members; the Fresh Food Market, dedicated to Bord Bia Quality Assured meat, poultry and fish as well as fruit and vegetables, will be tended by nearly 14 producers selling and providing information to the public, the Irish food board said.
Aside from the food and drink offerings, the floral, food and family festival, will feature 22 show gardens, 14 postcard gardens, 25 plant nurseries, 25 live cookery demonstrations with some of Ireland’s best-known chefs, all within a 70-acre site.
Bloom Inn
Reflecting the buoyancy of the Irish drinks industry, The Bloom Inn features 27 Irish drink producers, up from 24 last year.
This includes three brand new distilleries: Clonakilty Distillers, based in west Cork committed to reviving ancient malting barley varieties.
Lough Ree Distillery, a family run business that combines traditional whiskey distilling methods with modern technology. Micil Distillery is Galway’s first distillery to open its doors in over 100 years, and produces a unique peated poitín.
This year there is also a new group of Brewery’s attending, such as Ballykilcavan Brewing operating since 2018 as a brewery producing a variety of new craft beers; Mescan Brewery, founded by two vets and located on the slopes of Croagh Patrick producing Belgium inspired beers; and Wicklow Brewery, a newly established micro-brewery in Co. Wicklow.
Kitchen Stage
The Bord Bia Quality Kitchen Stage in the Food Village will host some 25 cookery demonstrations during the five-day event with Ear to the Ground presenter Helen Carroll on hand to interview the chefs, farmers and food producers.
Bloom 2019 will see well-known chefs including Neven Maguire, Rory O’Connell, Catherine Fulvio, Edward Hayden, Paul Flynn, Fiona Uyema, Gary O’Hanlon, Shane Smith, Chef Adrian Martin, Sharon Hearne Smith and JP McMahon.
New for 2019, gardening expert Gerry Daly will also take to the Quality Kitchen stage to demonstrate how easy it is to add home grown herbs into everyday meals.
A number of new producers will also showcase their products over the five day festival.
Last year's festival reportedly attracted over 120,000 visitors over the course of its duration.
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© 2019 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Donna Ahern. Click subscribe to sign up for the Checkout print edition.
