Series of Events Will Explore Food through History
A series of talks, exhibitions and activities exploring the hopes and fears of the past, through food, will take place across Worcestershire and Herefordshire next month.
Professor Maggie Andrews, from the University of Worcester, has been working with various county museums and locations to deliver five events as part of the nationwide Being Human Festival.
The Festival, the UK’s only national festival of the humanities, takes place from November 17–25. In Herefordshire and Worcestershire, it kicks off at Bromsgrove’s Avoncroft Museum with an evening of music, films, short talks, exhibitions, tasting and demonstrations exploring what Christmas and everyday life was like 100 years ago.
A 1916 foodfest: Bread, Jam and Christmas Puddings takes place on Thursday, November 17 from 6pm to 9pm.
There will be opportunities to try local jam and Christmas puddings, take a look at WWI recipes, view exhibitions on WWI, drink some mulled wine and do a little Christmas shopping and to enter a WWI bake-off.
Then on Saturday, November 19 from 11am to 4pm will be Jamfest at Croome Court. There will be an exhibition of stories of land girls and boy scouts who gathered fruit, plus recipes to make jam using salt alongside an exhibition about the formation of Pershore Women’s Institute 100 years ago. This exhibition is part of the official opening of the Plumlines Project at Croome Court.
On Monday, November 21 there will be an exhibition and talk exploring how life changed for people in Pershore during the First World War.
How the Pershore Plum won the Great War takes place at St Swithun’s Church in Worcester from 6.30pm to 8.30pm.
There will be samples of WW1 food to try accompanied by mulled wine, including jam made from the famous Pershore plums, a staple food for troops during the conflict.
The activities continue on Tuesday, November 22 with Pop the Pomagne – Spotlight on the Seventies at The Courtyard in Hereford from 10.30am to 3.30pm.
The Food Fest event will offer a multisensory experience featuring: exhibitions, short talks, creative writing workshops all inspired by the food of the 1970s. There will be images and adverts discussions and debates, newspapers extracts, tastings and quizzes to help you explore a decade of political strife when Britain voted for the first time about being part of the European Community.
Events conclude on Thursday, November 24 with a series of activities at The Hive in Worcester, on Thursday, November 24 from 12.30pm to 3pm.
There will be a series of activities to encourage participants to explore some of the hopes and fears which surrounded the use of food as a weapon of war in WW2. This will include talks by Dr Lisa Pine (South Bank University) and Elspeth King (University of Worcester), displays of rations, tasting of carrot marmalade, a quiz about what participants would be prepared to eat and a debate about how food plays a central role in conflict. This event is particularly orientated towards a 15-19 year old audience who often study WW2 at school.
For more information about any of the events visit www.beinghumanfestival.org or email Professor Andrews at maggie.andrews@worc.ac.uk
For information on courses at University of Worcester visit www.worcester.ac.uk or for application enquiries telephone 01905 855111 or email admissions@worc.ac.uk