Marlborough Festival Sets New Firsts
Marlborough Festival Sets New Firsts In New Zealand’s Premier Celebration Of Wine And Cuisine
The BMW Wine Marlborough Festival brings together the best of wine, food and jazz experiences and is the first major festival to offer several new features that will set the standard for future New Zealand events.
Marlborough, 8 February, 2002 - The BMW Marlborough Wine Festival kicks off this weekend in what promises to be a celebration of firsts for New Zealand’s premier wine, food and jazz experience.
In what is a first for the festival, organisers will introduce a Marlborough Signature Dish at the main cuisine event, Prenzel Cuisine Classics. The Marlborough Signature Dish, called the ‘Green Shell Grape Wrap,’ is a mouth-watering combination of steamed mussel meat, kumera, fresh coriander and garlic wrapped in a Sauvignon Blanc grape leaf. Noted New Zealand organic chef Peter Chaplin of Musical Knives Restaurant will unveil the dish after creating the winning entry in a nation-wide quest.
Another festival first
is the new state-of-the-art Fisher & Paykel mobile kitchen
valued at over $45,000 which has been created specifically
for the event, and will be officially opened by Lauraine
Jacobs of Cuisine Magazine. The mobile demonstration kitchen
will be used to make the Signature dish as well allow New
Zealand’s top culinary masters such as Michelin rated chef,
Louis Schindler, as well as Phillip Krail and Rex Morgan to
team up with NZ Beef and Lamb to create gourmet masterpieces
for festival patrons.
Janice Burmaz, the first ever woman to chair the festival in its eighteen year history, says the event will showcase the best that Marlborough has to offer the world in food and wine all at one single venue as well as setting new precedents for future festivals.
“The BMW Festival is an outstanding event that brings together thousands of people from around the world to celebrate and enjoy Marlborough’s wines together with the finest New
Zealand beef, lamb, salmon, mussels and organic produce, prepared by some of our top chefs. We are also delighted and honoured that Malcolm Gluck, the most influential UK wine and cuisine expert is able attend the festival this year.” Malcolm Gluck is the author of ‘Superplonk’, the number one selling wine guide in the UK for the last 10 years.
“We are also pleased to be the first festival in New Zealand to be able to offer visitors on-site bottle purchases which we see as a positive development for the wine industry and the wider appreciation of Marlborough wines all around the world. The off licence will allow patrons to take a take a selection of Marlborough wines home with them, and we hope it becomes the norm for all New Zealand festivals in the future.”
In addition, for the first time, a US radio station will broadcast, via direct satellite uplink, the wine festival to 32 markets in the United States expanding the coverage of the event way beyond the 7,000 people who are expected to attend in person.
ENDS