Green Bean

There was a time, not so very long ago, that sticking the word Welsh on a food label was a sort of curse. An unappetising by-word for a crumbling, inefficient economy stuck primitively in the over-sheeped hills. These days, changes are afoot and the only thing that's crumbling is zingy fresh, prize-winning Caerphilly cheese.

True; Welsh food culture ran to the hills in the face of post-war industrial agriculture. The mountainous terrain, the sometimes-poor soil and the infamous climate made it difficult to compete with the hedgerow flattening agri-giants of lowland Britain. With consumers valuing food produced with integrity and character, the family farms and rural businesses are now sitting on a gastronomic treasure chest. It's that same challenging climate and rural landscape that is turning out to be the trump card. Its the intense concentration of diversity and particularity that now make eating Welsh so exciting.

The new Welsh food scene, though, as well as being embedded in its glorious natural resources and cultural history, is also an expression of a vibrant, diverse and innovative society. The Welsh delegates who came to Terra Madre in October represented a spectrum of food producers and cooks who are together cultivating a future for food in Wales. Diversification of traditional farms, notably in the livestock and dairy sector has created a wave of distinct products from Welsh-Black beef slowly raised in the Cambrian mountain pastures to lamb weaned on to the Dyfi estuary salt marsh herbs, excellent cheeses from the teifi valley and super-rich buffalo milk ice-cream from Llanon. But diversification hasn't just happened at the farm level. One of the side-effects of traditional family farms going out of business has been an influx of cross-shifting alternative thinkers. Though in the last decade organic marketing co-ops have signalled the importance of mainstream organic production, Wales has been a sort of test bed for alternative, small scale food producers for several decades. These are the people who are keeping horticulture up-to the minute in Pembrokeshire, creating extraordinary cheese from the green pasture fed herds, putting Wales on the international honey map and raising organic, free range poultry.

The result of upheaval and decades of toil perhaps, but its this dynamic which gives Wales its current vitality. Haverfordwest Farmer's Market won the national award this year. It won it because of the diversity and integrity displayed with the juxtaposition of excellent value from; let's say, traditional organic meat butchered on the farm together with innovative young talent nurturing rare tomatoes and peaches in walled gardens, shellfish from the Pembrokeshire National Park coastline alongside farmed trout, and organic cheese beside this mornings milk bottled on the farm. This story is on a roll and the cooks and chefs who cater for locals and tourists are picking up on it. Chefs like Gareth Johns from Machynlleth, and Robert Schopp from Narberth are taking full advantage of the local ingredients and adding their creative flair in their respective Italo-Cymraeg and Hispano-Cymraeg Kitchens. As food festivals like Abergavenny, Narberth, Cardigan and Aberystwyth gather popularity and Slow Food convivium events build awareness and networks of producers and co-producers, the message that Wales has a rich offering from its farms and cooks is gaining volume.

Building the network in the food community and receiving a reassuring affirmation from interacting with 6500 other delegates that Terra Madre and Slow Food really contribute to this success. As Gareth Johns said: “the great thing about coming here has been to find that we are not alone”, and you get the feeling that he meant in Wales as well as in the world. Another Welsh delegate said she will go home with so many stories, but most important is what she feels and that is after all these hard years, to be proud of being a producer.

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