Outstanding in their field

Donkeys’ years ago I went with a chum who was writing for the Sun newspaper to Millwall Football Club as part of a Saturday sweep of England’s football grounds to establish which served the worst meat pies. I can’t remember which club ‘won’, but the competition was ferocious and, most importantly, Kelvin was happy. If the pies served up at the Den that day could have talked, they’d have chanted the same as the Millwall fans: ‘No one likes us — we don’t care!’

I’m not sure how much things have improved at our sports grounds, but at those other great British tribal gatherings where food has traditionally been a low point — pop festivals — miracles have been worked in recent years. After my first day at last year’s Big Chill festival, I realised that my problem was going to be having enough time to eat at all the stands where my fancy had been tickled. If, on the last day, seeing how many jalapeños my system could tolerate with one of Flaming Cactus’s burritos, as well as going back to Hall’s Dorset Smokery for some mackerel smoked right there on site, was going to mean having two lunches, then so be it. And I didn’t even have the munchies.

It was not always thus. In the Nineties, according to music magazine publisher Sarah Janes, ‘Eating was something you reluctantly had to do from time to time to keep going. It was very low down the bill.’ Now, with two small children in tow (and that’s by no means unusual at festivals today), she’s been putting a toe back into the water at her local Bestival on the Isle of Wight. ‘When we first went a couple of years ago, I couldn’t believe how much things had changed,’ she says. ‘Being able to take a break for a decent meal lifts the whole thing. And it’s a Godsend knowing you won’t have to worry about how to feed the nippers.’

Festivals have quietly — if that’s the right word — turned into big business. Put 30,000 people in a field for three days and even a daily food budget of a tenner a head (OK, they’re not all heads, but the maths is the same) gets you close to a million. With that sort of money around, the limited number of pitches available for food stands are oversubscribed, even at the monsters like Glastonbury, and the competition has driven up standards and made it worthwhile for caterers to attend a number of festivals over the summer.

The punters are a lot more demanding these days, too. Serial restaurateur Nigel Foster (Canteloupe, Camino), one of the Big Chill’s guiding lights, tells me: ‘Some of our customers will have been customers of Gordon Ramsay or Gary Rhodes the week before. They know what they want, and we’re able to give it to them.’ This year, in a stylish gesture that says they’ve really got the logistics sussed, there will be an oyster bar for the first time. So-hip-it-hurts Leon will also be bringing their ‘fresh fast food’ to the festival table for the first time.

‘We’re very excited,’ says Henry Dimbleby (yes, he’s related). ‘Our food is all about bold flavours. But it’s also energising — it’s not the kind of starchy fast food that will make you fall asleep and wake up fat. It’ll have you dancing all night.’

As more and more festivals appear, organisers are trying to innovate to differentiate theirs from the rest, and food is one area they can do this. One organiser, WOMAD (the world music lot), has even got the musicians cooking: it now features a World of Food area where musicians from across the world demonstrate their favourite dishes, sometimes just an hour or two after performing on stage.

Of course festivals are, by any calculation other than that of dividing the price of admission by the number of hours of fun and frolics to be had, expensive. So a spot or two of self-catering may be called for, especially at an endurance event like Glasto. A little advance planning, a cool bag and some quality cold cuts, pies and cheeses does the job for a day or two. After that, Sourced Market could be the answer if they’re at a festival near you this summer. A gaggle of Borough Market food specialists — and you know how good they are — set up a like a mini farmers’ market to provide top-line tent tucker.

Festival life throws all aspects of the gastric cycle into sharper relief, of course, and sadly some aspects have been slower to change. However good the food, strong stomachs may still be needed when the cycle completes itself, and you have to enter the unnameable horrors of the Portaloo.

But never mind about that now — what’s it to be next? Fabulous fish curry from the Goan Seafood Company (fishily enough, based in Mevagissey) or something more at home on the farm, a rich steak and ale pie from Pure Pies with absolutely no family resemblance to anything those Millwall fans might recognise?

Understandably, Pete wonders how he gets away with calling this sort of thing ‘work’.