The Ballymaloe Literary Festival of Food and Wine brought some of the world’s best known chefs, critics, commentators, kitchen gardeners, foragers and wine experts to East Cork. The festival was held at Ballymaloe House and Ballymaloe Cookery School. In addition to the usual festival activities (readings, talks, panel discussions) they held demonstrations, tastings, producer visits, foraging expeditions, lunches, dinners and a brew bar.
Bewleys, Robert Roberts, Golden Bean, Badger and Dodo, Ponaire, Cloud Picker, Baileys and Nic’s Tea were all represented over the course of the festival on the SCAE brew bar.
The objective of the Ballymaloe Literary Festival of Food and Wine was to bring together a wide, varied and international group of cookery writers, journalists, bloggers and critics whilst also offering a varied programme for professional and non-professional food enthusiasts from Ireland and abroad. The SCAE fit seamlessly into this programme as we brought various methods of brewing several different beans to the fore and hopefully brought filter coffee to the wider public.
The brew bar concept itself is a kind of inside out bar. With grinders in the center, and different hot water delivery at each of the 3 stations. Each station featured a different brewing device: Chemex, V60, Aeropress and Espro Press.
The brew bar will reappear at the main SCAE show in Nice in June.
