Harvest Festival this Saturday

A number of Chamonix locals have been working hard this summer to create their own little bit of the good life and now they want to share it with you with a day of tasting and learning about growing vegetables. Best veg competitions, cook-offs, street food stalls, live music, home-baked goodies and more await you this Saturday at Hotel Le Vert by the lake at Les Gaillands.

We spoke to Julian Heasman from the Mountain Garden Company, who explained how the idea came about, “a few of us got together and thought how can we do our little bit to reduce pollution and help to develop the cultivation of growing vegetables and fruits in the valley. So we came up with the idea that every year we should have a Harvest Festival with some prizes for best vegetables and various other categories associated with creating foods using fruits or vegetables from one's own vegetable patch”.

The idea has caught on and various folks have got on board with the project. The Boutch à Boutch community garden in Les Pelerins has been going from strength to strength this summer and has been welcoming all sorts of green fingered enthusiasts to come and get involved. The garden has been going for four years now and has evolved from a basic veggie patch to a complex permaculture site, channelling natural weather conditions and creating beneficial micro-climates to grow all sorts of fruits and vegetables on a relatively small plot of land. The project is a true collective, with no hard and fast “rules”, and no experience required to get involved. Everyone is welcome and no matter how much or little you can contribute, you are encouraged to reap the benefits.

The resident experts are Timothée Mottin, Guillaume Pras and Joseph Brizzy. They’ve dedicated countless hours to creating an efficient and sustainable garden - harvesting and reusing seeds, composting waste, using local resources such as donkey manure as fertiliser. Everyone is welcome to come along and learn from them, especially now that the end of the summer is near and the garden needs harvesting before winter sets in. You can turn up any Sunday between 4pm and 7pm to lend a hand and contribute whatever you can in terms of time or know-how.

Auberge du Bois Prin up near the Brevent lift station has long had a fine reputation for their excellent cuisine made from home-grown produce, so they were more than happy to be a part of this “grow your own” scheme. Owner Dennis Carrier has been sharing his extensive knowledge and offering expert advice to local gardeners on how to develop your own vegetable patch, and on what delicious dishes you can create with the results.

The harvest festival will take place this Saturday at Hotel Le Vert from 11am onwards. There will be fresh fruit and veggies galore, as well as prizes to be won for your homemade pickles, chutneys, cakes, pies, etc, If you’re not much of a chef then you can just wolf down the bounty from the street food stalls or give your verdict at the cookery demos. No harvest festival is complete without a vegetable “best in show”, so bring along your biggest marrows and rudest parsnips to be judged by the expert panel.

There will also be games for the kids, face painting, live music… and of course a few beverages. We hope to see you there!