.jpg){kind=logo}
.png)
Sign up for our food and books newsletter.
FESTIVAL
Food & Words 2022
Tiny, but mighty personable, the Food & Words writers' festival turns 10 this year. To celebrate, we plan to serve cake. Other than that, we are committed to delivering a festival program that features some of the country's leading writers on food in an atmosphere that is both generous and hospitable. Read more on the Writers' Festival page or go straight to the booking page to purchase your ticket.
Date Sunday October 9
Time 10am-4pm
Location Enid Cook Room, Level 1, 405 Crown Street (above Surry Hills Library), Surry Hills
Cost $330 (plus booking fee)
The world's most intimate writers' festival
Classes & Events
Classes & events
COOKING CLASS
We visit the dairy and make butter, jam and more in the kitchen
We start with a visit to a small, family-operated dairy in Kangaloon and then head to the kitchen to discover the magic of separating cream from milk, making butter and buttermilk and using them in a traditional scone recipe. We'll make jam and sup on a three-course meal made using produce harvested from the Moonacres farm. Read the menu and find out more about this lovely day at the beautiful Moonacres Cooking School in Robertson in the NSW Southern Highlands by clicking the link below.
Date Sunday, 24 September
Time 10am to 2pm
Location Moonacres Cooking School, Robertson
Booking $395
The Dairy Farmer & The Chef
“You learn to cook so that you don't have to be a slave to recipes. You get what's in season and you know what to do with it.' –Julia Child
We meet monthly at Randwick Library
Food has a magic power that gets everyone talking. We all have a favourite food memory or recipe to share, so why not join the fun at this monthly gathering where we'll chew the fat, swap recipes and compare notes on our favourite cookbooks. The recipe club provides fun for people interested in sharing recipes, cookbooks, talking and writing about food, talk cookbooks and writing about food, so why not bring your enthusiasm and love of food to the library. Everyone is welcome to come along.
Day Second Thursday of the month
Dates Dec 14 - the final meetup for 2023!
Time 1pm to 2.30pm
Location Randwick Library, Level 1, Royal Randwick Shopping Centre, 73 Belmore Road, Randwick
Cost This is a FREE event
Join the Club
RECIPE CLUB
“Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea.”–Henry James
FOOD TALKS
Food as a means to interrogate and interpret.
In this talk, colonial Australian food academic Jacqui Newling presents the various ways she uses food to interrogate and interpret history for academic research and public history audiences. Food is more than what’s on the plate; it is imbued with cultural meaning.
She is joined by Russian author Anna Kharzeeva, who will talk about exploring family and social history through food: cooking, eating and writing about it.
The host for the evening is Barbara Sweeney.
Date Wednesday, 4 October
Time 5pm to 6pm
Location State Library NSW, Macquarie Street, Sydney
Tickets This is FREE event
History Now: food history
Scone, pastry and MUCH more
Let’s Bake is a social baking session where cooks of any level come together to bake, share knowledge, trial new recipes and enjoy time in the kitchen. A different menu of sweet and savoury items will be baked each week and, at the end of class, we’ll sit around the table, accompanied by a fresh brewed pot of tea, and tuck in. Recipes are a mix of new takes on old favourites, all taken from Barbara’s favourite cookbooks. They have been selected because they are simple enough to cook easily inside class time. The rather ambitious menu differs from week to week – and can be adapted to accommodate student requests. The focus is on learning how to make different pastries, scones and biscuits.
Date Friday, 13 October to Friday, 3 November
Time 10am to 1pm
Location North Sydney Community Centre, Miller Street, North Sydney
Cost $200
Let's Bake
BAKING COURSE
SCONES CLASS
Join us in the kitchen to bake the perfect scone
Join Barbara Sweeney in this special scone making class where we'll all make a batch of scones using ingredients bought direct from farmers – yes, even the wheat – and cook recipes from different cookery writers’ recipe books, designed to showcase different methods of making scones, plain and fancy. Banter over a cup of tea about whether scones should be served with butter or cream, or both.
Date Friday, 24 November
Time 10am to 1pm
Location North Sydney Community Centre, Miller Street, North Sydney
Booking $100
Scones & Afternoon Tea
SCONES CLASS
How to bake the perfect scone
Join Barbara Sweeney in this special scone making class where we'll all make a batch of scones using ingredients bought direct from farmers – yes, even the wheat – and cook recipes from different cookery writers’ recipe books, designed to showcase different methods of making scones, plain and fancy. Banter over a cup of tea about whether scones should be served with butter or cream, or both.
Date Friday, 24 November
Time 10am to 1pm
Location North Sydney Community Centre, Miller Street, North Sydney
Booking $100
Scones & Afternoon Tea
Photography credits
Pasta Vicki Bennison
Book stack Samantha Mackie
COOKBOOK SALE
Good qaulity secondhand cookbooks for sale
The annual cookbook sale is our contribution to the circular economy in that we keep good cookbooks in circulation. When you buy a secondhand book you not only reduce waste, recycle and reuse, but you also get to enjoy the thrill of something 'new' — to you.
We collect and buy books through the year and always have a selection to suit every cook, from popular titles in excellent condition to well-thumbed classics. If you're rationalising your own cookbooks, and would like to donate them to the sale, please get in touch.
Date Saturday, 2 and 16 December
Time 8am to 12 noon
Location Northside Produce Market, Ted Mack Civic Park, 200 Miller Street, North Sydney
Annual cookbook sale
“I just spent a wonderful rainy afternoon watching the talks, yet another thought provoking, fascinating and compelling collection of ideas and authors.”
Read about the speakers here
Three writers whose work ranges across Instagram and printed books talk about their experiences with both. Hear from cookery writers Belinda Jeffery (A Year of Sundays), Lucy Tweed (Every Night of the Week) and Emiko Davies (Torta dell Nonna).
What exactly is Australian food? Chef Ross Dobson, author of Australia, The Cookbook, along with fellow writers Paul Van Reyk (True to the Land, A History of Food in Australia) and Lee Tran Lam, freelance food writer & co-founder Diversity in Food Media and Editor of the anthology New Voices in Food take on the question in this panel.
Session 2
Read about the speakers here
OUR PARTNERS
Coffee partner The Little Marionette
Tea and tisanes partner Apotheca by Anthia
Wine partner Lowe Family Wine Co.
Bookshop Potts Point Bookshop
Venue and food Martin Boetz, Cooks Shed
Food & Words seeks the best vittles
We are proud to work with
TALKING
Join chef Martin Boetz from Cooks Shed and home cook and food writer Barbara Sweeney in this Zoom chat as they talk food, cooking and cookbooks. It's a #bloodylockdown project, only here as long as the Sydney lockdown lasts. Join the conversation.
BYO. Tickets $11.
Every Sunday while lockdown lasts, 5pm
The Sunday Session
PROJECT
A storytelling session about food, books and cooking. Written and presented by Barbara Sweeney, it’s an amusing and thoughtful exploration of this publishing genre and its place in the world. Of particular interest is the handed-down, hand-written recipe book and their stories.
In development
Cookbook Love
Responsible for our Food & Words poster illustration – copy to go here.
Canberra artist
Meet Ella Phillips
In the spirit of reconciliation, we acknowledge the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.
Food & Words produces food events with a literary bent
Writers’ festival
.jpg)
Author talks & dinners
.jpg)
Book
launches
.jpg)
Cooking
& writing classes
Writing Courses
'Each weekly get-together was a warm celebration and such an incentive to keep writing.' —Susan M, Write with Intent student
.png)