FOR ALL BOOKINGS & INFO
www.foodadventures.co.uk /07789 85 7818 /
riveralde@btinternet.com
THE ALDE VALLEY FOOD ADVENTURES™
The Bario & Kelabit Highlands Food & Cultural Festival 2008
Already in its third year, The Bario & Kelabit Highlands Food & Cultural Festival is a week long community owned festival held in the Kelabit Highlands of Central Borneo. It is the first overseas joint venture with The Alde Valley Food Adventures and the first community based indigenous food festival in East Malaysia.
The Kelabit Highlands are the homeland of the Kelabit race and home to one of East Malaysia’s and Borneo’s most remarkable intact traditionally farmed and forested landscapes. The 20 villages and longhouses of the Highlands, including more remote Penan settlements and hunting areas, are located within a high plateau drained by the Sungai Dappur river and the upper reaches of the mighty Baram river. The villages of the central basin and more outlying river valleys are surrounded by wet padi fields of Bario Rice, fruit orchards, and partly farmed or previously settled secondary forests. These give way to more remote river valleys, many containing a rich variety of modern and ancient megalithic monuments, burial sites, cairns and carved landscape features. The most remote valleys, near the Indonesian border, remain a refuge for many of Sarawak and East Malaysia’s most iconic wildlife species, including Rhinoceros Hornbills, Helmeted Honrbills, gibbons and the rare Bornean Clouded Leopard.
The Festival celebrates the farming, forest and cultural heritage of the Kelabit Highlands with a growing programme of events and activities.
This page is currently being updated. For more information about the Kelabit Highlands and local foods, including Bario Rice, Bario Salt and Pa Mada cinnamon, please email riveralde@btinternet.com or visit www.ebario.com . We hope you will come and join us in Bario for Festival 4 in 2009 – or for the Miri International Food Festival in August 2008!
Villages in the Valley
11th April ~ 9th May 2009
Mondays to Saturdays 11am–6pm
White House Farm, Sweffling Road, Gt Glemham, Suffolk IP171LS
A four week exhibition in the Lambing Barns at White House Farm. Come & join a celebration of local crafts, farming, landscape, villages & churches in the beautiful Alde Valley of East Suffolk. Part of the Alde Valley Spring Festival.
Marcia Blakenham ~ Marchela Dimitrova ~ Meriel Ensom
Jason Gathorne-Hardy ~ Kate Giles ~ Maggi Hambling
Mercury Hare ~ Raymond Hopkins ~ Robina Jack ~ Ffiona Lewis
Tessa Newcomb ~ Jim Parsons ~ Sam Taplin
A four week celebration of food, farming, landscape & the arts in the beautiful Alde Valley of East Suffolk. Held in association with White House Farm open farm events, The Alde Valley Food Adventures TM & local food venues up & down the Alde Valley. White House Farm is open to visitors from Monday to Saturday: Nature Walk, Hazelwood Camp, fires, Farm Films & light refreshments. Cyclists, walkers & families welcome. Free car parking. Warm clothes & boots recommended. Hazelwood Camp for families on Saturday afternoons. No dogs please.
Programme
Saturday 11th April: Opening of Festival Exhibition ‘Villages in the Valley’. 11am - 6pm. Nature Walk, Farm Films, Fires and Suffolk Books to Read. Free parking. Come by bus, bike, foot or car.
Saturday 25th April:
Wild Food & Wood Weekend @ White House Farm. Wild Food & Woodland Walk and Milling Demonstration. Rendezvous : 11 am @ White House Farm. 1 1 1 hour walk followed by Wild Food Buffet in association with farm cafe in Marlesford & a good old hawthorn & hops hedgetarian salad TM. 18.00 pp. ** please book ~ see below
Thursday 30th April: A Brief Look at East Suffolk Publishing. Book cover designs from Suffolk Printing Houses. Evening talk @ White House Farm. Talk from 7pm – 8pm followed by a light buffet supper. £16.00 pp. BYO wine, rug / cushions. ** please book ~ see below
Saturday 2nd May: Bulgarian Spring Celebration: come & join us for a cross cultural celebration of Bulgarian food, landscape & icon paintings with guests from northern & central Bulgaria. 12pm – 4pm @ White House Farm. No booking necessary.
Thursday 7th May: Pesta Nukenen Bario: The Farmed & Wild Foods of the Kelabit Highlands in Central Borneo ~ talk& slide show from 7pm – 8pm followed by a light buffet supper. £16.00 pp. BYO wine, rug / cushions. ** please book ~ see below
Saturday 9th May: Borneo Day: Pesta Nukenen Bario. A celebration of traditional food, farming & forest heritage in the Kelabit Highlands of Central Borneo. Traditional irau [Feast], fabrics & dancing. 2pm – 4pm £ 20 pp Children under 16 £5. Under 5s free. ** please book ~ see below
** T 01728 663 531 or E riveralde@btinternet.com for all bookings
Festival menus:
White Lion Hotel, Aldeburgh. The White Lion Hotel has refurbished its restaurant with a specially commissioned set of drawings of The Suffolk Trinity [Red Poll cattle, Suffolk Sheep & Suffolk Punch]. The hotel is promoting itself as a local food hub, with an excellent new chef and ingredients from the Suffolk countryside. To celebrate the Spring Festival and local foods, the Hotel is launching Suffolk Sundays, with traditional Sunday roasts of local beef, lamb & pork. 50 yards from the
beach. Papers, bar & lounge. Tel 01728 452 720 for more information or bookings.
The Golden Key at Snape has won a cluster of awards for its local menus. Open 7 days a week with daily Spring Festival menus of Alde Valley Lamb TM & other local foods. The pub also stocks a full range of Adnams beers & wines. 5 minutes from the Sailors Path to Aldeburgh. Tel 01728 688 510.
The farm café, Marlesford. Open every day from 7.30am. Famous for its Suffolk breakfasts - including Revett’s sausages& Lane Farm black puddings - & its range of handmade & home cooked pies. Drop in for a Festival Suffolk breakfast [or lunch or tea] on your way to the coast. Tel 01728 747 717.
For DIY Alde Valley Food Adventures in the Alde Valley. Local market days: Mondays @ Campsea Ashe, Tuesdays @ Framlingham, Wednesday @ Saxmundham. Snape Farmers’ Market 1st Saturday of the month. Excellent local shops in Framlingham, Saxmundham, Middleton, Yoxford, Hacheston, Aldeburgh, Snape, Leiston, Orford, Hollesley, Knodishall & Peasenhall …. Come & Tuck In !
Coming Soon : WOVEN DREAMS
An exhibition of Pua Kumbu textiles from the Rumah Garie Longhouse in Sarawak.
The Pua Kumbu are hand woven Iban textiles from Sarawak. The textiles are made using cotton and silk on traditional back looms with natural dyes. The patterns have contemporary narrative content. Pieces range in size from 600mm x 1200mm to 1200mm x 2000mm.
The exhibition will also feature a collection of contemporary Kelabit Kabo bead necklaces made by master bead workers in Miri and Bario in the Kelabit Highlands. There will also be a small selection of contemporary working baskets from coastal and inland Sarawak.
Exhibition Opens : Tuesday 26th May until Friday 5th June
Open Daily from Monday ~ Friday 10 am 8 pm
Open on Saturday : 10 am 5 pm
THE PRINCES SCHOOL OF TRADITIONAL ARTS
19 22 Charlotte Road, London EC2A SG
Nearest Underground : Old Street
Woven Dreams is part of a 2 week celebration of the cultural arts, forests and indigenous foods of Sarawak in East Malaysia.
The exhibition is being held in association with Society Atelier Sarawak, Jason Gathorne-Hardy and The Princes School of Traditional Arts.
More information about other events will be placed on the website shortly.
THE ALDE VALLEY
Go Green ~ DIY Food Adventures™ & the 118 / 119 Rural Bus Route
The Alde Valley is stuffed with good food. From honey and jams to soft fruit and dairy products; from estuary fish and seasonal game to local lamb, pork, poultry and beef; from organic vegetables and local breads to smoked meats and bacons : you name it and the Alde Valley probably has it ! To discover this for yourself, why not organise your own DIY Alde Valley Food Adventure TM. Orford is well stocked with fresh fish, smoked meats, a good butcher and plentiful beer. Aldeburgh is full of cafes and restaurants serving local foods, with an excellent butcher, deli, pubs, inshore fishermen and hotels. Nearby, Leiston has three butchers, a deli and even a fish and chop shop selling local fish and Red Poll beef burgers. Inland, Saxmundham has a thriving High Street with a butcher, deli, farm shop, Wednesday Market Day and town centre supermarket. Downstream at Snape there is a cluster of pubs serving local produce and a monthly Farmers' Market. Framlingham, like Saxmundham, has a weekly market on Tuesdays and Saturdays with a butcher, two delis, a baker, a new farm shop and good mix of cafes, pubs and restaurants. In between, there are cafes and shops at Hacheston and Marlesford, whilst the Upper Alde Valley is full of livestock and arable farms – and an excellent variety of local pubs serving locally produced foods. The Alde Valley and East Suffolk have good rail connections via Saxmundham and Ipswich. The roads are generally quiet and often very scenic, with inland and coastal National Cycle Routes. Or, if you want to leave the car behind, why not jump on the 118 /119 Rural Bus Service, running between Ipswich, Framlingham, Saxmundham and Leiston. It passes so many excellent local food businesses and nearby village hotspots – including Earl Soham, Rendham and Great Glemham - that we have nicknamed the 118/119 the Rural Gastro Route !
WHITE HOUSE FARM & THE ALDE VALLEY FOOD ADVENTURES™
Amazing Grazing in The Alde Valley ~ History of Livestock Farming
The Alde Valley is home to some of the most beautiful countryside in the East of England. From the coastal estuary and heathlands to the inland river valleys and clay uplands, it is blessed with a rich mosaic of marshes, water meadows, woodland, heath and productive arable land. At a passing glance, this landscape can seem no more than an attractive back drop to the villages, towns, rivers and byways of rural Suffolk. But look more closely and the intimate connection between farming and the countryside soon becomes apparent. The coastal heathlands, a mixture of heather and scrub woodland, were once grazed by large roving flocks of Suffolk sheep. The sea walls and inland sluices helped to maintain huge areas of low lying pasture and water meadows grazed by sheep and cattle. Further inland, among the towns and villages, an extensive fabric of small fields and grassland once supported hundreds of small family owned livestock businesses producing beef, lamb, mutton and dairy produce. Although many of these have now disappeared, The Valley is fortunate to retain a growing number of independent livestock businesses, all of which contribute to the ongoing survival of the familiar rural landscape.
The Alde Valley ~ Superstore Free from Source to Sea
One reason for the continued survival of small independent livestock farms in The Alde Valley is the absence of a superstore in its catchment area. The local food retailing fabric is unusually intact. It is dominated by farm shops, farmers markets, market town traders, weekly markets and town centre supermarkets. These all provide a very welcoming and supportive retailing environment for new and existing food businesses. The local food economy is consequently exceptionally dynamic and employment rich. This in turn has helped to open up new opportunities for local food production, with very high levels of product innovation and business creation. Local foods, sometimes dismissed as being exclusive or marginal are, neither of these things – they are about jobs, innovation and great tasting, good value grub!
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