WHILE a cornucopia of food and drink is on the menu at Worcester’s third foodie festival next weekend, a small corner of the city centre is offering a fun alternative to the top chef demonstrations, food stalls and kids cookery workshops.

New Street and Reindeer Court non-food businesses are running ‘The Alternative Foodie Trail’, where members of the public can take part in a treasure hunt for ingredients used in one of the Hangar Café’s dishes.

Popi Pridojac, who runs Mangojuice Gallery in New Street, has organised the event which will run on Friday July 20 and Saturday July 30.

She explained that 11 businesses are taking part and each one will have a raw ingredient or an artistic/creative version of an ingredient in their shop which is used to make The Hangar Treat.

“People can go into any of the businesses and pick up a copy of ‘The Alternative Foodie Trail’ map. They have to go to each business and look for the ingredient inside and get their map stamped in the shop.

“When they have all 11 they can drop off their completed map into the Hangar Café or the Kings Gallery and Mangojuice Gallery,” said Popi.

The businesses taking part are Amore; Brimstone Gallery; Cranes Music; Embrace Boutique; Gallery Candles; Iapetus Gallery; Jumping Clay; Me & My Friend; Monkee Business; Rock Follies Vintage and The Kings Gallery & Mangojuice Gallery. People can also go along to the Hangar Café which is offering a free tasting of the Hangar Treat.

The trail competition winners will be drawn out of a hat on Sunday July 31 and each business has donated a prize. The prizes include Jo Downs glass, a stack of chocolates, a child’s rucksack, vouchers and a ukulele.

Popi added: “We were asked for different ideas to do something during the food festival but not necessarily food related. All the businesses were very keen to take part and we hope it will bring people to Reindeer Court and New Street because it is not one of the main thoroughfares.”

New Street food businesses are also throwing a street party on Friday July 29 from 4pm to 7pm. The road will be closed and people can go along and enjoy tasting menus, special offers and enjoy live music.

Nadja von Dahlen from Worcester BID said: “The street party is being put on by the food outlets in New Street and Reindreer Court and they are showcasing what they have and there will be live music.

“The foodie festival is one of the highlights of the year in Worcester and we have a great mix of food and dinking. It is a wonderful atmosphere and one of the best things about the festival is that it is free to attend and the cookery demonstrations are free.”

The festival starts on Friday July 29 (an extra day for this year) and continues on Saturday July 30 – finishing on Sunday July 31. There are more than 70 stalls – 19 being run by local producers – and there are three demonstration areas. The main stage is in High Street between Bank Street and Church Street (near WH Smith). The food and drink tasting area is in High Street outside the Guildhall and the kids cookery workshops and food experiments will take place in Bell Square (at the back of Boots), Chapel Walk, Crowngate.

For more information about all the events during the Worcester Foodie Festival visit http://www.worcesterbid.com/foodie or download the festival programme at http://www.worcesterbid.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/BID3266_Foodie_Festival_Programme_A5_24pp_WEB.pdf

Chef demonstrations will be given by Dean Edwards from ITV’s ‘Lorraine’; Felice Tocchini from Fusion Brasserie, Stoulton, Worcester, and Richard Fox Richard - an award-winning writer, cook book author and TV chef presenter.