Hey chocolate lover, Foodepedia knows that Chocolate Week is like Christmas for you. So for Chocolate Week this year (11-17th October), we’ve put together a few other things that you could do to celebrate.

Every year, when the weather turns wintry and Christmas is on the horizon, I would start my search for the perfect dark chocolate truffle for the season. So when I heard about William Curley’s chocolate making masterclass, I thought to myself “what a perfect way to spend a Sunday afternoon”.

The beef got a bit overdone, but Nick Harman loves lunch with fellow foodies at the Guinea Grill to sample some of the best of our island produce in quintessentially British surroundings

Up in Manchester, food is being taken as seriously as it is anywhere down south. In fact up north they have perhaps even more local produce and local crafts to celebrate, being less subject to the winds of trend as us soft southerners are. Nick Purves pops up to the Food Festival and gamely avoids making the usual jokes about baggies and being mad for it.

The blue lights flashing through the Fire Stables in Wimbledon Village from the Paramedic car parked outside are too little, too late. The dead bodies lined up on the table are beyond help; they won’t be flying again.

We’d come to L’Atelier des Chefs cookery school to learn about Canadian ingredients hosted by the Canadian Tourism Commission. And despite the Canadian chat about syrups of birch and maple, berries of cloud and lingon, almost every attendee was neck-craning for the fiddlehead ferns.

On the 19th of October 2005, Canteen was opened to the public at Old Spitalfields Market where it was welcomed with open arms. Fast forward to today, Canteen remains a firm favourite of critics and customers alike and continues to serve traditional dishes like devilled kidneys, potted duck, fish and chips and treacle tart. And it seems that everyone who is anyone on the food scene has eaten there, liked it and written about it; everyone from A A Gill to Fay Maschler.

The idea of Handpicked is that head chef Jeremy Bloor from Harvey Nick’s OXO restaurant takes the press to visit one of his suppliers, in this case, his cheese one. Towny girl Anita Pati tags along avoiding cowpats and gets to eat a locally sourced al fresco lunch in a field with a load of random strangers.

Reinvention has certainly suited Sambrook’s. Since its first cask was tapped in November 2008, over one million pints have been served to thirsty punters across London. Junction, one of its two permanent ales has even won Beer of the Festival at this year’s Battersea Beer Festival. So on a sunny Saturday afternoon, Qin Xie headed down to Sambrook’s to see what the fuss is all about.

On the Upper Richmond Road in Putney, lobsters meet their maker and chef Dom Robinson makes them into dishes that defy standard gastropub cliches. Nick Harman squeezes into the royal kitchen to hear a bit more about the Prince’s philosophy.