The bank holiday weekend could only mean one thing for the NEFF team; the weekend we had all been building up for was finally upon us… Big Feastival.
The Publicasity team has been working hard on the search for NEFF’s Next Cookaholic for the last few months and the renowned food festival, held at Alex James’ farm in Kingham, was where the hunt culminated with a nail biting, head-to-head cook-off with the two chosen finalists.
The challenge: create a fish pie using a unique recipe and including a secret ingredient selected from one of the exhibitors at Big Feastival.
Kicking off proceedings, the two nervous finalists arrived on site and were whisked away for one-to-one sessions with the NEFF home economists for a final discussion on their chosen recipe. They then set off on their search for their secret ingredient – supermarket sweep style!
Once their ingredients had been sourced, the cooking began. The two finalists, Janey Green from Stratford Upon Avon and Nicky Corbishley from Cheshire, headed backstage to prepare their dish, still keeping their special ingredients top secret.
As the cook-off approached, so did an enormous thunderstorm, halting proceedings and adding to the tension. However, MasterChef finalist and NEFF brand ambassador, Stacie Stewart, was on hand to calm the nerves and give her top tips on how to deal with live appearances.
At 4.00pm we were ready to go. Stacie Stewart and the two finalists headed onto the Big Kitchen stage and the cook-off began. The finalists prepared the toppings to their fish pie whilst explaining to the audience why they should be NEFF’s Next Cookaholic and what inspires their cooking at home.
Samples of the two fish pies were handed out to the audience to guess the secret ingredient and help Stacie decide who should be crowned the winner. A sea of red foam hands filled the audience as they voted… Nicky’s fish pie with a cheddar and onion crisp topping had wowed both the crowd and Stacie, who was able to guess the secret ingredient straight away.
Now with a kitchen fitted full of premium NEFF appliances, more culinary creations are bound to take place from Nicky’s kitchen and her new place on NEFF’s Cookaholics panel is sure to provide her with plenty of inspiration