WITH less than a month to go before the Droitwich Spa Festival, preparations are well underway, with the food and drink festival, launched last year, teaming up with the existing music and arts festival for the first time.

The festival will see events taking place in Droitwich from Friday, June 20 to Sunday, July 6, with the food and drink festival on the Saturday bringing a range of stall holders to the town, from local producers to those coming from much further afield.

Stalls have completely sold out already, with everything from cheeses, ice-cream, and homemade breads and cakes, to chocolates and fudge, jams and marmalades, and chutneys and pickles on sale, as well as a catering village selling hot foods.

The festival is also set to feature a large marquee in Victoria Square which will host a demonstration kitchen where people can pick up tips from five top Worcestershire chefs, and there will be a roving jazz band and a stilt walking chef and waiter roaming the site.

The Gardener’s Arms is playing host to a cheese and cider festival on June 28, while the festival is launching its own competition, open to local butchers, shops, pubs and restaurants within a five mile radius of the town, to find the town’s best sausage.

The sausages will be judged as part of the festival, before and after cooking, by a panel of qualified food judges with a winner announced on Saturday, June 21.

Younger chefs from five to 15 years old will also be able to join in the fun with a junior bake off, where they can enter one large cake or a batch of 2 smaller ones to compete for prizes.

On Sunday, June 29 The Old Cock Inn will be hosting Friar Fest, a festival of music and culture taking place on Friar Street, and throughout the festival there will be everything from live music in the town centre, and literary events, to theatre performances, and jazz and classical concerts to see, as well as a number of art displays and activities, before the festival culminates in the Big Picnic in the Park at the Lido Park on July 6.

To find out more about all the events taking place, or to sign up for any of the competitions, visit droitwichspafestival.co.uk.