Look who we met at the Allergy Show in Liverpool…

Two scary tigers creeping around the floor of the show…..

Fortunately, though, Spider-Man was at hand to protect show visitors so the organisers did not need to worry too much…. And the good people of Liverpool took having their Allergy + FreeFrom Show invaded by wild animals and super heroes with their usual charm!

And how did thus come about? Well thanks to Doves Farm who, apart from their two demonstration theatres and their expert panel discussion with Claire and Michael Marriage, had imported the lovely Tanya from Taleena Face Painting. She was not only painting beautiful Doves Farm doves on everyone’s faces (see Spider-Man’s chin…) but creating tigers, and superheroes for those who were up for them. (And if you think that the tigers were great, take a look at Tanya’s Facebook pages – her Halloween faces are AWESOME!!)

Preceding Tanya in the Doves Farm theatre was the morning yoga session – run this year by Dru Yoga who were doing a series interesting ‘expand your heart’ moves which were, I am sure, excellent for you. They were also slightly less challenging for early morning, non-yoga-savvy bodies than some of the stretches we have had at previous shows!

And then, before the show closed, we had music. On Saturday this year the singer was Olly Flavell, a coeliac who had visited the show last year and so loved the music slot that he asked if he could play this year. And a very fine job he did too!

I am also delighted to report that on Sunday no less that three of our FreeFrom Food Awards judges were demonstrating in the Doves Farm guest kitchen – Nathalie (of Callum, Nathalie and The Intolerant Gourmand), Halima Ferreira (one of our new chef judges) and Christine Bailey and her son Isaac (of the FFFA Children’s category fame).

The weather for most of our stay in Liverpool this year was not kind, so I did not stride around the streets quite as much as usual. But I did manage a brief, if somewhat sodden, visit to my favourite cathedral. Even though I have now seen it many times I am still gobsmacked each time by the faith that a mere fifty years ago was still able to raise such a staggeringly huge and magnificent tribute to their God.

I do also love the RC cathedral down the road (locally known as Paddy’s Wigwam). But in view of the scluicing rain my Sunday morning visit was waived in favour of the Pullman Hotel’s rather excellent (if also rather expensive) breakfast. However, the weather did improve on Sunday afternoon showing off the Allergy Show’s new venue on the  waterfront at its very best.

We did also venture out this year from our favourite, if not very freefrom, Italian family restaurant, Il Forno, to a new and very kool eaterie called Oktopus. They were not a freefrom restaurant but in fact many of the to-be-shared and super delicous platters either were naturally free from or could very easily be made so by a small amount of tweaking. Chickpea panisse with a black olive caramel dressing was particularly delicious and actually, I thought, better in its milk-free (minus the Manchego) version. (Cressida had it minus and I had it plus…)

Back in the show, the queues at the Schar stand (offering rather humbler but very tasty gluten-free sausage sandwiches) and the Middleton Foods stand (offering yummy gluten-free fish and chips) stretched round several blocks.

Cressida has done her usual round up of the great new freefrom foods on offer around the show – see here for her report – so I won’t go there – except to mention two lots of cakes.

The lovely Willows Cake Kitchen – who nearly had a heart attack when they found Spider-man taking a picture of their splendily freefrom and gorgeously cute cakes. And yes, the whole of the shoe is edible – the shoe box is the cake!!

And then we had some cake baking visitors – Emma and Lissy from Bake_a_cakes. Emmie and Lissy are two little girls with allergies who love to bake – so they do!! They have a blog on Facebook and if you go there now you can see them at the Allergy Show and take  look at their great pumpkins and Halloween treats.

So another fun, jolly and successful Liverpool Allergy Show – enjoyed by visitors and exhibitors alike. And it  is so comforting to know that wherever we go in the future we will always have a seriously scary tiger to take care of us!!