New festival to showcase Taste of Sheffield traders

A Taste of Independent Sheffield from September 21-23 will feature local traders, many of them selling food and drink, from the city and South Yorkshire region.Organisers at pub and bar operator True North Brew Co hope to appeal to smaller start ups which might not be able to afford other events.

They are also putting on a miniature gin festival after another one due to be held that weekend by Gin Festival Limited in Kelham Island was cancelled.

Kane Yeardley, owner of True North, said: “That weekend all the freshers are back, there’s the Sheffield 10K on and there was due to be the gin festival at Kelham Island that weekend - if you think about it it is the busiest weekend of the year.

“So we thought we could have a food festival with a focus on Sheffield independents, a big tent with a gin festival inside and a mixture of comedians and Sheffield bands on too.

“This is the second gin festival which has gone wrong in Sheffield - it’s bad for the city.

“We felt sorry for people who’d had the festival cancelled so if they bring their tickets they can have their first gin and tonic free.”

The festival will take place in the city centre, and applications for traders open this Friday, July 20. Costs are being kept low to help smaller traders, said Kane.

He added: “The Sheffield Food Festival was great and had an amazing turnout but some smaller traders couldn’t afford the stands - it’s run by a business and they’ve got to make money which is understandable.

“We will be happy if we break even.” To apply for a stall email [email protected].