Cambridge Food Festival – Hartbeespoort

Yesterday we spent time at the Cambridge Food Festival.  We had heard about it on radio 702 and it sounded like a good outing.  We had mixed feelings about the day.  Our main gripe was that we felt the entrance fee of R50 for adults and R25 for children under 5 was excessive.  The entrance fee is not mentioned on the web site.  I would far rather have spent R125 at the stalls than just to get in.  If the cost is so high to keep out the riff raff then maybe give some stall vouchers.  We can go to Neighbourgoods Market which is closer to home, pay no entrance fee and buy food of the same unique quality.  The other negative was that althogh they claimed to have a kids play area, that didn’t really consist of anything.  There was a synthetic ‘ice rink’ but the kids who payed to go on there seemed unable to scate on the surface.  Ok, well that’s off my chest, now for the positives.

It was a glorious ‘winters day’ about 25 degrees and clear skies.  It was lovely to be outdoors relaxing, drinking beer and eating some good food.  For lunch we bought gourmet vetkoek with Thai green curry filling and Indian butter chicken filling, they were very good.  Apparently they will be selling these vetkoek at Neighbourgoods market soon too.  Fjord made his own pizza at a fun stall who also take their ovens to kids parties where kids can assemble their own pizza and get a free apron.  If you live in Johannesburg and are interested you can mail them @ piperparties@gmail.com.   There were quite a few micro brewers, we tried Cape Brewing Company (R40 for 440ml bottle, a bit pricey) and our favourite was Chameleon Brewery.

There were a lot of very different and interesting foods on offer.  We loved Jan die toffie Man, he had the most unusual toffees, believe it or not lime and chili toffee is amazing!

I think if we had paid a lower entrance fee and not started the outing off feeling a bit ripped off we would have left with a better taste in our mouth, still it was a good outing.