Allowing Tooting’s home cooks to show off their culinary skills using produce grown and sourced locally. Celebrating Tooting’s culture and wonderful local produce.

Tooting Foodival is a sustainable, local, low food mile food festival in South London. It was an event which truly represented all cultures with the diversity of people and food being huge. The Top Tooting Cook competition (part of Tooting Fooddival) was held on the Saturday 15th September.

The cooking competition presented curries, chutneys, apple cakes and much more with over 30 dishes being presented. The judges included: Nazish Omar, owner of Deelicious, a crepe and cake café next to Tooting Bec Station, Ricardo Gibbs, who runs Rick’s restaurant in Tooting Broadway which serves local fabulous french dishes, the owner of Khalsa Centre Gurdwara where the festival was held and Lillie Langford, who was last years under 16s winner of fooddival.

The prizes were incredible – including an Abel & Cole’s box and a trip to Nandos. One winner whose competition name was The Baked Bean Boy served up a spicy, variety of vegetables chutney. With a flavour punch and beautiful presentation – it was a winning dish. Belinda Tudor who was the organiser of the competition thought “the wide range of dishes highlighted the diversity of Tooting”.

After going to the spectacular festival – it made me think on how we as a nation need to start using our local and seasonal foods. Not only will it save our environment by watching our carbon footprint but the tastes and textures of the garden and allotment beat supermarkets’ vegetables and fruit any day.