After the emotional rollercoaster of the last two weeks, it was good to get back into the kitchen on Monday and Tuesday this week. Of course, when we do an event we hope we’ll sell out of ranges such as our chocolate bars, but it was actually a bonus that we hadn’t as it meant the production demands of this week were kept to a minimum.
Wednesday was another quick zap up to Wakefield to organise final details for Dad’s funeral next Monday and do a little more clearing out and locating of various bits of paperwork.
By Thursday, the chocolate bars I’d made on Monday and Tuesday had stabilised – ideally, chocolate needs about 48 hours to stabilise after it’s made, before it’s packed. When I get an urgent and last minute order this isn’t always possible, but it’s something we try to factor in when we do our delivery estimates.
This weekend it’s been the Towcester Food Festival at Towcester Racecourse. The setting was beautiful. The weather, unfortunately, was not, and as a consequence, numbers were down as everyone avoided a day in the rain.
The show was opened by William Sitwell, who, once he’d declared the show officially open, made a point of coming around to every stall and having a chat with all the producers. We sold him a bar of our Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Caramel – I hope he enjoys it!!
Overall, we had a reasonable show, given the numbers through the gate. The biggest disappointment was the torrential downpour of rain 45 minutes before the show closed, meaning break down was a logistical nightmare!