The "Tasty Treats for the Festive Season" event, to be held next Tuesday, November 25, from 6pm-7pm at the Dunningham Suite, 4th floor, Dunedin Public Library, will have a special guest — popular Dunedin seasonal cooking expert Alison Lambert.
Our Food Network chairwoman Robyn Zink said Mrs Lambert would share her insights into how to use fresh, local produce to create delicious dishes and answer questions from gardeners in the audience on how to get the best out of their current crop of vegetables.
"It will be fun and informative to put Alison through her paces and see what she can come up with," Ms Zink said.
As well as being fun, the session would be a good way to highlight that most produce and products used by Dunedin consumers came from outside the Otago region.
"Locally, we spend $15 million each week in Dunedin supermarkets, mostly buying produce and items from outside our region," Ms Zink said.
"If we spent just a little bit more on local produce, imagine what that would mean for our local producers."
The event was also a good opportunity for an end-of-year catch-up for the community, and all interested people were welcome to come along from 5.30pm to enjoy a chat and a snack before Mrs Lambert’s presentation.
Ms Zink said this year had been a busy time for Our Food Network, which had organised and hosted several community hui and continued to work on its advocacy for strengthening local food systems, as well as asking searching questions of local council candidates.
The "Digging In" event, held in conjunction with Toitu Otago Settlers Museum, had also been a great success.
The organisation was in the process of appointing a co-ordinator for the Community Fruit Harvest project, with plans to get under way next month.
It would also soon start recruitment of a new project manager for next year.
"We have some ideas in the pipeline for next year as well, including establishing a local community food challenge, which would give us a chance to profile local growers and producers and the retailers who stock their produce," she said.
The organisation was also planning to work with the Wild Dunedin Festival to present an event around local food history, and what could be learned from it.
