The Great Dorset Chilli Festival

I cannot believe that it is a year since we were in All Cannings, near Devizes,  and the first Dorset Chilli Festival was advertised. That was the first such event and I missed it, this year, however I didn't. First of all the venue was great deal closer than I thought, Wimborne St. Giles is just over the Hampshire/Dorset border and a mere forty-five minutes drive from Gosport.

Unfortunately we were cash limited, we only took fifty quid, especially after paying the twenty-four quid entrance fee, so we didn't have much left for food, beverages etc. There were loads of chilli sauce stalls and a few chilli plant stalls. The taco bus was our venue for lunch, nice steak taco with guacamole, salsa and sour cream.

A local skiffle band were performing, bashing out skiffle cover versions of some well known contemporary numbers, my tractor's on fire, the eye of the badger and, my favourite hit me baby one more time.

The Mariachi, or semi-mariachi band were also pretty good.

Whilst me misses enjoyed a stereotypical Caribbean chicken n' rice n' peas, I overheard a conversation concerning chilli pork scratchings which, apparently were available from an outfit named Fire foods so Will and I set off to search for the same. The taster was tasty and not too spicy so I bought two packets. Opening one to try a few, which we all did, proved to be a lot more hot than I had anticipated. They did taste awesome so please check out their website:

www.firefoods.co.uk

Emma tried some chilli cider, a rather peculiar hot and cold combo the worked, the bottle contained a chilli pepper and seeds. The ice-cream stall, predictably, was doing a roaring trade, Emma and Beth used the last of our cash to buy some but they did avoid the chilli flavour ice-cream which I found slightly disappointing.

All in all an expensive afternoon but I will definitely attend next year, Insha Allah.