You may think the Times Cheltenham Literature Festival is all about food for thought, but Kate Townsend fids plenty more visceral things to chew on.

We’re all going a bit bonkers for street food right now, but what about roof […]

With chocolate week upon us, Anita Pati travels to York where chocolate is in the very air and immerses herself in a Chocolate Indulgence break. All the visits are spread over a couple of days giving you time to recuperate in your wonderful four-poster bed – if you book the deluxe room – before heading out for more engorgement. So why daydream of chocolate hunks when you can stuff a cityful in

Things are done differently in the country though, they hunt things, they kill and mostly eat the things they hunt, they are comfortable with corduroy and welly boots and mud. Here at Ashdown Park Hotel and Country Club part of the same Elite Hotels Group as The Grand Eastbourne some things are still done pretty much as they would have been done thirty years ago.

What do you like to do in your spare time? Read books, knit scarves, make airfix models of Lancaster Bombers perhaps? Not Tom, he likes to chop up bits of dead animal for fun! It might sound peculiar but butchery is something of a hobby of his: he really does enjoy spending time in the kitchen boning a shoulder of pork, spatchcocking a chicken or knocking up a brace of pork pies.

On a recent visit to a health food shop a’new generation’ of Superfood worthy of the Olympian gods flew off the shelf into Annabelle Hood’s shopping basket. It’s green, it’s mean and it’s heroically healthy.

Do you like your steak dry-aged, wet-aged, from cows that roam the Scottish Highlands or run free on pampas grass in Argentina – and how can you tell the difference? Joanna Biddolph visits The White Oak in Cookham for a steak masterclass with chef-patron Clive Dixon and master butcher Peter Allen – and unexpectedly bites off more than she can chew. 

‘When this rice is done, the grains should be standing on end, begging you to eat them, almost dancing around the pan’, declares Arun Kapil, himself doing a fair spot of the latter as he jigs about eulogising about Green Saffron’s AAA Vintage Basmati rice. He and Carom’s head chef, Balaji Balachander  have got a biriyani on the bubble, to demonstrate why this particular grain strain is just so superior.

This particular evening was hosted by Olives from Spain, who had roped in Omar to demonstrate a variety of marinades for their olives, before the very nice chap from the cookery school talked us through a couple of more of Omar’s recipes, also featuring quantities of olives.

David J heads to Belfast to find a city with its troubles behind and a staggeringly good foodie future to come. If all you know is the infamous Ulster Fry Up, think again.