The streets of Hucknall were packed yesterday (Sunday 22 August) as people flocked to the town's inaugural Food and Drink Festival.

The event, organised by Ashfield District Council, with partners Discover Ashfield and Lincoln Green Brewery, ran from 10am-5pm.

There were 26 stalls in total which offered customers the chance to sample and buy a range of food and preserves such as pizza, crepes, cheese, cakes, doughnuts, cookies, jam, and honey. Along with the variety of food, were stalls offering craft beers, cider, rum, and gin.

Speaking exclusively to Nub News at the event, Councillor Jim Blagden said: "This is fabulous for the Hucknall community, fabulous for the stallholders and just fabulous for regenerating Hucknall town, let's have more of it. Let's get the people back into the town centre."

Even though social distancing restrictions have been eased, the organisers still put measures in place to try to make everyone feel as comfortable as possible whilst they were at the festival. These included hand sanitiser dispensers at regular intervals down the high street as well as being available at every stall.

It was clear this was the busiest the town of Hucknall had been since before the pandemic began. The hope for local businesses will be that this momentum will be built on ensuring a regular footfall in the town centre once again.

Councillor Blagden added: "It's so important to see the people back shopping and enjoying themselves in the town centre and talking to each other."

The turnout exceeded all expectations as the residents really got behind the event and showed their support increasing the likelihood that this will not be a one-off event.

Speaking exclusively to Hucknall Nub News, Anthony Hughes, founder of Lincoln Green Brewery, said: "I think it's been fantastically busy right the way from 10 o'clock this morning when we first opened, we suddenly found that there were a lot more people who'd turned up than we were expecting. We thought it would be busy between 12 and 2 and it's been an absolute constant stream of people literally from opening so it's been a fantastic turnout; it really is good.

"On the basis of this turnout I think we can safely say that Hucknall is definitely going to have another food and drink festival like this next year and who knows maybe we can even do another one towards Christmas. There's definitely room for more traders, there's plenty of space for us to continue to expand; this is definitely going to be here to stay."