Bolton Food and Drink Festival 2017, including the Aidan Byrne Pop-Up Dinner and an Introduction to Carrs Pasties

Today's weekly(ish) phone call to my mum soon turned, as usual, to the subject of food. She'd been reading a James Martin magazine column about Bolton Food and Drink Festival, in which he sang the praises of a foodie extravaganza that is increasingly well-regarded and to which, until a couple of weeks ago, I had somehow never been. Part of this is no doubt sheer laziness on my part - driving to Bolton from South Manchester is easy enough, but if you want a drink you're looking at several different forms of public transport and a pretty early curfew.

Finally though, I've been, thanks to overnight accommodation courtesy of some lovely Bolton friends and an invite to the Aidan Byrne "Made in Bolton" pop-up restaurant. Byrne was until very recently at the helm at Manchester House, a restaurant for which I have a lot of time, although he has now moved to a consultancy position within Living Ventures. A great chance, then, to try his delicate food in the relaxed environs of a giant tent pitched in the middle of Bolton, offering three courses from a set menu that I had trouble choosing from because I wanted it all.

In the end, the relaxed environs didn't prove particularly relaxing. I imagine it's tricky turning a multipurpose temporary marquee into a glamorous restaurant for one night only, but the efforts were perhaps a little wide of the mark - table cloths and proper crockery, yes, but strange disco lighting and curiously dancey music that set a rather uncertain atmosphere. Some of the others at our shared table felt the venue looked a little like a tacky wedding disco, although I think this was a bit harsh. And anyway, we were here for the food. For starters, we both had the shellfish bisque, grilled Sicilian red prawns and saffron mayonnaise. This was superlative, with a strong, punchy flavour that spoke of a fish stock many hours in the making, and served with two fat prawns, a generous crouton and a healthy blob of excellent mayo. This was a great start, although one wonders why such beautifully presented food was served up under such strange lighting. I've deliberately not fiddled with the photos, so you can see how everything actually looked on the night as it pulsed through a variety of pastel colours.

For my main, I was lured in by the meaty delights of the braised beef cheek, choucroute, Wagyu fillet tartar, sweet miso hollandaise and beef Secretto ham, although I should in truth have gone for the red pepper-crusted cod loin with aubergine caviar and mussels which my date had ordered. Everything on my plate was, individually, lovely, but the overall effect was just too meaty, meaning that none of the elements stood out and I found myself longing for a bit of greenery just to break up the wall-to-wall beef. And yes, that's a terrible photo, but when you put a brown dish under purple lights I'm afraid that's what it looks like. The fish dish was lovely though, and perfectly balanced in a way the meat dish wasn't, with the comforting blandness of the cod pepped up by the saltiness of the mussel sauce and the sweetness of the red pepper crust. He won again on the next course - I chose the selection of regional cheese and biscuits in preference to dessert, whilst he had the chocolate mille feuille with hazelnuts and violets. The cheese course was generous but a bit generic and quite variable in quality, with a lacklustre Brie letting the plate down. Meanwhile, the mille feuille was a thing of great beauty and delicacy, shot through with flavours of parma violet that prevented the chocolate from being too rich, and snarfed in a millisecond by a man who claims not to like puddings.

Service was also a little variable, with a huge fleet of young people on hand - some of them excellent but some rather guilty of whipping plates away before people had finished. Byrne said himself on Twitter later that night that he wasn't happy with how the night had gone, but we enjoyed most of it very much, and certainly wouldn't be put off eating at one of his restaurants again. In any case, we were also by this point quite merry from the selection of brilliant Aldi wines available at ludicrously cheap prices.

The next day we explored the festival itself, with the friends who had kindly put us up the night before. It's an impressive affair, with far more stalls than I had imagined (more than 200 traders attended) as well as two music stages, an Aldi wine tent and loads of chef demos (including the aforementioned James Martin, making his ninth consecutive appearance). More than 300,000 people attended over the four days of the festival, but because the stalls are spread out over Bolton town centre, things don't feel too claustrophobic or busy, and you can kid yourself you're walking off the seven lunches you've consumed. I'm pleased to say I enjoyed my first ever Carrs pasty so much I had two (the new cheese and jalapeno one is an absolute winner), and I was equally delighted to track down Paul from Fatjax Chutney and stock up on some essential pickle provisions.

So whilst this might have been my first Bolton Food and Drink Festival, it certainly won't be my last - roll on next Summer and my second consecutive appearance.

Festive Feasts at The Vegetarian Society Cookery School

Ah, Christmas, the most emotive of all the C-words. Whilst I'm not keen on shops full of Christmas tat and festive music before the start of Autumn, I'm very happy to eat Christmas food at pretty much any time of year; I'm a big fan of wintery food in general, and any occasion that encourages the consumption of sprouts, pre-lunch booze and one's own body weight in cheese gets my vote every time. As a blogger, this all-year-round love of Christmas food is useful, as festive previews tend to be over the summer, and thus it was I found myself a couple of weeks ago at The Vegetarian Society in Altrincham for a Christmas cookery school.

The weather, naturally, was beautiful, and the sunshine streaming in through the French doors meant the Christmas tree set up in the corner of our reception room looked a little forlorn. It's amazing how quickly you can get into the spirit of something though, and as soon as we were in the kitchen with our genial chef Alex, it was surprisingly easy to buy into the whole thing, particularly with the prospect of some mince pies in the offing. There were eight of us on the course, grouped around a central island worktop set with individual stations - it's a lovely kitchen, with plenty of space and several cookers, hobs and sinks so that you don't all end up queuing to wash your hands at the same time. We began with some knife skills and then were straight into the festive baking, working together to make mincemeat before rolling out our own pastry and each making four mince pies. I've always wanted to be the sort of person who makes their own mincemeat and it was really very easy (especially if you make The Lady Sybil do the elbow grease, as seen below). Alex also demonstrated a couple of dishes, but even these were very hands-on, with jobs assigned to anyone making eye contact at the wrong moment.

Over a cup of tea and one of our own mince pies (which were perfect - not too sweet and each the size of a small house), we got to look through a selection of recipes and each choose one to make. This is a great idea, and my favourite part of the whole course - every cookery school I've been to before has given everyone the same thing to make, whereas the idea here is that we each make something different and then all sit down to a real feast of dishes. This could, of course, be a little daunting for the inexperienced cook, and it did take a few minutes to get my head round where everything was (mind you, my mum has lived in her current house for 17 years, and I still can't ever find anything in her kitchen). The recipe I'd chosen - the Stilton and Walnut Cheesecake with Port and Blueberry sauce - was fairly straightforward though, and Alex was on hand to help with any questions and to laugh at me for accidentally setting my Port sauce on fire just the tiniest bit.

The afternoon flew by, and it was soon time for us to proudly carry our dishes through to the serving table and sit down for Christmas dinner. There wasn't a duff dish amongst them, although my favourites were my Stilton tart (due to the presence of a great deal of cheese rather than any skill on my part), the spectacular Chestnut and Butterbean Wellington and the astonishingly good Sumac Carrot Smash. Alex joined us for lunch along with cookery school manager Jonathan and media officer Su, and great company they were too; in fact everyone on the course was lovely, and the atmosphere was festive indeed.

The whole day was brilliant fun, and I actually learned a few things as well as confirming that my love of sprouts remains undiminished. The people at the Vegetarian Society are lovely, and not the least bit preachy to the array of (mostly) carnivores sitting in front of them; instead, they're all about showing that vegetarian food can be just as good (and sometimes better) than its meatier equivalents. I rarely cook meat at home any more, and whilst I shan't be going back to vegetarianism any time soon (last attempted when I was 16, and trying to convince Morrissey I was the girl for him with no idea I was barking up a very wrong tree indeed) I will definitely be making a number of the recipes from the pack - even the Nut Roast looks good. Maybe not until nearer December though...

- The Vegetarian Society Cookery School is at Parkdale, Dunham Rd, Altrincham WA14 4QG. The next Festive Feasts course is on Wednesday 8th November and costs £139, good value for a full-day course where the numbers are kept low. Just beware your friends and family will expect you to replicate the entire feast for them single-handedly, as mine are currently baying for.