THERE’S A BUZZ TO HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS

The month-long Hampshire Food Festival (1-31 July), organised by Hampshire Fare, has already been buzzing with brilliant events, including ‘It’s a Bee Thing’ – new to this year’s Festival.

 

Business and nature were the buzz words at this special event held at The Good Life farm shop and café in Headborne Worthy, Winchester, Thursday, 5 July. It featured informative talks from Becky Chadd of Beckys Beezzzs, beekeepers and honey producers based in Amport, and Mike Wagstaff of Chalice Mead, producing traditional honey-based mead created from a medieval recipe (based near Petersfield), leading mead’s comeback in Hampshire.

 

Becky Chadd’s engaging talk encompassed the effects of weather on the hive, how bees communicate through the waggle dance, and moving hives onto the New Forest to make distinctive and delicious heather honey. Meanwhile Mike Wagstaff took the audience on a journey from Butser Ancient Farm to The Eden Project, after founding Chalice Mead through a desire to reconnect with nature, create a mead for the modern palate and support our bee populations.

 

Both talks were followed by question and answer sessions with a strong response from the audience who showed interest in environmental concerns and keeping bees as well as advice on developing and marketing their own businesses. The evening finished with tastings: distinguishing between different honeys (such as floral runny honey, set rapeseed honey and heather honey) and a range of flavoured meads (including chilli, chocolate, elderflower, ginger, hawthorn and nettle).

 

Tracy Nash of Hampshire Fare says: “Every July the Hampshire Food Festival offers plenty of new events and experiences. The idea for ‘It’s a Bee Thing’ came about at a meeting with The Good Life Farm Shop, I was keen for people to discover the amazing products that are being made locally thanks to Hampshire bees. The event brought together such a diverse audience, in terms of both ages and interests, who were really engaged with the topic. The speakers were excellent, their personal passions were presented as story-telling with fascinating and sometimes amusing anecdotes. Members of the audience commented afterwards that they felt they had discovered a new world. I hope we revisit this topic again as I strongly believe that business working to protect and support our environment and wildlife is a hugely important issue that needs to be discussed and supported.”