Lunch serves up a taste of festival

Donnybrook’s wineries will be on show in September when the Donnybrook Food and Wine Festival food and wine committee hosts its first long table lunch event.

Due to the global pandemic, the annual festival was unable to go ahead, but committee member Gail Byrne is hoping the upcoming lunch will be the committee’s saving grace.

“Because of COVID-19 we had to cancel the annual event which was a real shame, but when restrictions started to ease we thought we may as well try and put something together,” Ms Byrne said.

“I spoke to Sam Licciardello from Orchard 160 about having it in the packing shed so that it could go ahead regardless of the weather and we could maintain numbers while adhering to guidelines, and he was all for it.”

Popular Bunbury restaurant Market Eating House will be catering the event and guests will be able to wash down their meal with a glass of wine from one of eight wineries within the region.

But if you are looking for a ticket to the one-off event, you may be out of luck.

“We sold more than 100 tickets to the event within the first 10 days of advertising it,” Ms Byrne said.

“There are eight wineries involved so far including Mazza Wines, Bakkheia Wines, Oakway Estate Wines, Barrecas Wines, Mandalay Road, Barton Jones, Smallwater Estate and Thomson Brook.

“We were absolutely overwhelmed with the response and are hoping to put the funds raised from the event into the committee so we can put on the biggest and best Donnybrook Food and Wine Festival next year.”