Travel: Glastonbury Foodie Review- Day 4

Today I woke up rather late, and wandered off to see a bit of music (Mik Artistik in the pic below is a really funny Northern comedy singer, such a laugh!) and for a bit of a wander. For those hippies out there, near the Cabaret tent, is the “Hare Krishna Tent”- it is for fellow hindu’s/ Buddhists/ old fashioned hippies, where theres hindi music playing, and you can get a plate of free vegetarian food. With me not really being hugely into the whole hindu/ meditation thing (not against it, just not my thing) I didn’t blag any freebies, but it’s useful to know if your’e really down on your luck at Glasto I guess.  I then went to the Pyramid to see Dizzee Rascal, who was fairly good, but I’d seen him a few years before at a much smaller stage and he was much more better/ much more enthusiastic (I think the fame has gone to his head a bit now…bless….).

Now this is where me and my parents were horrifically disappointed this year- Malinkey’s gourmet Glastonbury restaurant (near the Big top tent- you can see the big top tent behind it in the picture). As mentioned in one of my previous entries. Previously this place had been excellent, but since the first year of service they have been getting worse and worse, and after this year my family will be definitely be avoiding it in the future. Malinkeys offers a gourmet 3 course meal for £24 per person- posh nosh, things served on slates and things like that. You can also get chilled champagne/wine from £18 a bottle! Pricey, but in previous years, I must admit, it has been worth it, just for the Glastonbury gourmet experience. Me and my family arrive, to an almost empty restaurant- except with an incredibly loud (and untalented) lounge piano singer drolling on, a small group, already on starters when we got in, and a couple, with a very small, loud, crying baby accompanying them. After ordering drinks (and being informed they have no sparkling water- c’mon guys if you’re going to have a posh-ish restaurant you’ve got to have fizzy water!!), these then arrived with plastic cups (not glasses like previous years), which the waitress proceeded to spill all over my dad and the table. She apologised and went off to get something to clean it with, and took ages. The waitress came back with a couple of napkins, dabbed them vaguely and messily on the table, and then (without properly cleaning it up, or taking our food order, or taking the dirty drink soaked napkins away) went over to a table with friends and sat down and started chatting! We were livid! We also asked members of staff to turn the music down, this request was utterly ignored.

After sitting on the dirty table, with the violently loud dreadful lounge music, being ignored, and to be honest seeing some of the food come out to the two other tables in miniscule portions, we decided we weren’t going to waste any more of our time, or any of our money on the place. As we were walking out, dad ended up chatting to the owner, and told him his issues about it all. The owner said to dad “well I don’t see anyone else complaining”, which is so funny and ridiculous because the whole place was empty, save for 1 hippie couple with a screeching young baby, and a table of four, which was populated by his friends!!

We needed a bit of cheering up and some decent comfort food after this, so we went to the Greenpeace stage, to the farmers market area I mentioned earlier, and we got some grub. I got a really really nice chilli from one of the stalls there. It was a “vegan” chilli, but I kinda ruined it by shoving a load of cheese on top of it, lol. The guys working there was really friendly, and gave me it for cheap because he saw my crew pass, which was very cool of him. It was a delicious chilli, made with tomatoes and pepper and beans and all sorts of lovely vegetables, served with brown rice. It was one of the healthiest things I had at the fest this year, but also one of the nicest. I was so glad that we decided to leave Malinkeys- we would have left over £75 quid out of pocket, still hungry, and deafened if we had!

Me and the parents then just went for a wander round Shangri-La area. Noticed what I believed were a couple of new editions to the site (although I don’t often go round this area during the festival so for all I know they could have there for donkeys), one of them was a big cool looking Mojito bar- but with something cooler- Salsa lessons! So if you fancy learning a new dance whilst at Glastonbury, making all those “dad dancers” cry with jealousy, you can pop to this tent and they do proper salsa lessons  at 1pm, 3pm and 5pm Friday-Sunday. I hope if I go with my boyfriend next year, that they will still be doing this, sounds like a right laugh!

Round the corner from this place was also a very impressive south African food stall, with, what I am to understand from my boyfriend “traditional south African cuisine”- in other words MEAT!! Basically I have been informed that generally in South Africa anything that moves and can be hunted, will be eaten, in large quantities. This was a big South African “Braii” stall (Braii just being the saffa word for Barbeque basically). But at a Braii, you would be skinned alive for putting a sausage or a burger on the Barbie- oh no no no no! Only big chunks of good quality meat, or perhaps white meat and veg kebabs (at a pinch) would ever grace a south African Braii. At this stall I believe they had barbequed pork and beef, as well other interesting animals such as ostrich and buffalo. Being still full from the chilli, I didn’t partake of their offerings, but the smell alone was certainly making me drool.

We then went for a bit of a wander round “The Common”, an area with lots of funny interesting buildings, lots of “Aztec-y” looking things, including a bar with a waterfall in front, that you had to walk through to get in!!

Near the common also was “The Lost Picture Show”- the Glastonbury cinema! It’s quite small I guess (only about 30/40 seats I’m guessing?) but they always show some interesting films. On the Saturday at 2am they were showing Predator!!!! Cool!! Get to the Choppa!!!

Near the cinema was still really cool bar, called The Heaven bar. Basically around the area there were lots of devilly and hell-y things, that you could wander around, very dark and sinful and scary! Next to this area was the heaven bar- but you couldn’t just go and have a drink there. When you went in, there was all this staff in white (The Angels), and if you wanted to come in, to drink and watch the musicians on the stage in there, you had to convince them you deserved to go to heaven. My friend convinced them by explaining how much she loved animals, they asked her if she had any pets, she said she had two dogs, and the Angel asked if she knew their birthdays! By knowing them, she was deemed loving/compassionate, and was allowed through the golden gates!!

I went back to my campsite to chill with my mates for a bit, and to get myself for the big day, Saturday with the Stones!!! It was so cool though, on the way back, me and mum encountered a zombie/chanting smoke show, near the Astrolabe area. At one point, the smoke machines made the air so thick, me and mum could barely see in front of our faces or into the fog, it was so cool/creepy!! A very cool and sketchy end to the evening.