The Main Stage
The festival's Main Stage hosts a mix of local and celebrity chefs. Chefs give live cookery demonstrations, creating their signature dish live, whilst discussing the things that matter to them most in the world of food.
All demos are free to attend, and visitors can come and go as they please. Times and chefs are subject to change.
Between each demo, we invite some of our traders to speak about their business and their products. So stick around to hear their incredible stories!
Local twins Alex and Oliver have always lived and worked on the Suffolk Coast. They now run The Regatta restaurant in Aldeburgh alongside The Plough and Sail and The Golden Key, both in Snape. Oliver will be joining the Main Stage demo crew to showcase the kind of food they offer at their local restaurants.
Masterchef The Professionals finalist Adam Spicer is Head Chef at The Greyhound in Pettistree, a historic grade 2 listed countryside inn with a daily seasonal ingredient-led menu. The concept is predominantly traditional English countryside cookery with a European influence. A large focus is on Suffolk’s seasonal produce, with game and nose to tail at the forefront of their menu.
Co-founder of Wahaca restaurants, and food pioneer (recently seen on Laura Kuenssberg’s Sunday morning BBC programme discussing current food issues!), Tommi is a chef, writer, restaurateur and honorary Festival Patron.
Rob Mace
13:00
Head chef at The Crown Hotel in Southwold, Rob will be giving a demo of some of the regular dishes at this great restaurant.
A British chef and chef proprietor at Quo Vadis, London. He had previously been head chef at the Blueprint Café for eighteen years. A regular face on our most-loved cookery TV shows.
A French professional chef, Pierre is one of a handful of chefs in the United Kingdom to have been awarded the coveted three Michelin stars at his restaurant La Tante Claire in London.
Andrew Clements
15:00
Andrew is main point of liaison for The Hotel Folk’s newly launched chef development programme. Andrew was one of the original apprentices at Jamie Oliver’s Fifteen restaurant and featured on TV’s Jamie’s Kitchen. Since then he has worked in several prestigious hotels and restaurants with famous names including Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant in Padstow, John Torode in London, Yotam Ottonlenghi, Marriot Hotels in Kensington and the Ritz Carlton Hotels in Barcelona.
Chef/Patron at The Unruly Pig, named the best gastropub in the UK in the Estrella Damm Top 50 Gastropub Awards in 2022, Dave is a huge local talent that we’re really excited to have demoing this year.
Charlotte is one half of Brownie and the Bean, and will be helping to compere the Main Stage on Saturday.