Find the world on your plate at the World Kitchen in Leith
Just five days to go to the opening in Leith Links on Saturday 13 June and it’s getting decidedly hotter in the World Kitchen in Leith. [See also World Kitchen Cooks up a Storm]
At today’s planning meeting we started writing those last minute lists that always keep on growing. We’ve ordered tables, gas burners, and hot plates for the cookery demonstrations. Have we remembered the kitchen roll, bin bags, first aid kit, and paper plates? Don’t forget napkins, cutlery and table clothes. Oh yes, and how about some fine weather!
Gurmit Singh is collecting marquees to cover our stalls (whatever the weather). Mridu Thanki will soon be heading for Planet Asia in Norton Park, off Easter Road, who are generously providing ingredients for our cookery demonstration on Gala Day.
Since our first story about the World Kitchen in Leith, just about a month ago, the planning team has grown. We are really delighted to be joined by Agnes Holmes, chair of the Africa Centre,(see also Women in Harmony, another creative venture bringing people together) and Luis Lino, an electrician with a passion for food . And there will be plenty of room for more to get involved in future World Kitchen events.
Between 12 and 4pm on Saturday 13 June we will be celebrating just some of the wonderful mix of cultures in Leith with food from Africa, India, Portugal and Scotland. Not to mention a display of baking from different parts of Europe and Asia when the World Kitchen stall opens at 10.30 am.
Until World Kitchen in Leith has its own website, Leith Open Space will be keeping tracks of recipes and recording stories about food from different countries. Right now we are concentrating on spices, prawns, chicken, potatoes, courgettes and peppers for Saturday’s menu. And I am off to practice making potato scones on my camping gas cooker!
A planning session in Out of the Blue: from the left Fay Young, Gurmit Singh and Mridu Thanki. Pictures by Nick Gardner
World Kitchen sounds a great idea, another stroke of genius!
Apparently Harrison Owen came up with the Open Space idea because he had attended so many conferences where the best bit was the lunch-break, and he wanted to design a process that would capture that value.
What form will the event take? I can imagine a succession of demos at a stall at the Festival where one nationality follows another with a demo of their cookery. Hope you will include someone doing a Scottish meal (haggis or something rather than deep-fried Mars bars!) and even an English one, although I think watching a steak and kidney pudd steam for 4 hours wouldn’t be much of a draw for the crowds.
Good luck, and I’ll make a point of coming along.
Thanks Maggie, and I agree, lunch is always the best part of our Leith Open Space events!
Yes, World Kitchen will be staging a succession of demos with a mix of different foods for people to taste – maybe Portuguese pancakes with an Indian vegetarian dish, or African meal with good old Scottish-Irish potato scones (or cakes). Definitely no fried Mars Bars!