Scottish Food News – May 2015

We start this month as we mean to go on – with an evening of enormous and delicious burgers. In the first of Spit/Fire’s new ‘Gimme Shelter’ series of kitchen takeovers, Newcastle burger supremos Fat Hippo take over the Edinburgh wine and beer bar with a whole host of tasty concoctions, most of which involve bacon in one way or another. Bacon jam? Seriously? If that’s a thing, we’re both terrified and intrigued, and will be there to assess the situation on your behalf. We may need a bib. 4 May, 26 Dublin St, spitfirebars.com

From burgers to beer, and the fantastically-titled Cambolicious festival in the East Neuk of Fife. It’s got everything you might look for in a beer festival – a whole heap of locally-produced cask ales, a nifty country setting, some live music to keep things interesting, and, em… axe-throwing. Grab a beer, take in the country ambience, throw an axe around, home in time for dinner. Now that is a quality use of a Saturday afternoon. 9 May, 2-8pm, Cambo Estate nr Kingsbarns. Tickets £10, cambolicious.com

Lest you think this month’s column has peaked early with all that axe action, may we present 'immersive' and 'multi-sensory' whisky event Create:Eat:Whisky. Brought to you by award-winning pop-up foodies Jelly and Gin, C:E:W promises to turn your senses against you with a whole gamut of tricks and experiences to go with your evening’s drinks. Expect confusing aromas, sounds and sights to sit alongside a range of tasty cocktails. 14-17 May, various times, Gayfield Creative Spaces, 11 Gayfield Sq, Edinburgh. Tickets £33, jellyandgin.com

Moving back to beer, but this time in the heart of the capital, the Summerhall Beer FestivALE returns. Festiv-ale, you see? Oh, Summerhall, how droll of you. We’ll leave the snark to one side though, because this should be a good ‘un – Williams Bros, Top Out and Thistly Cross will all be in attendance, as will Summerhall’s resident brewery Barney’s and distillers Pickering’s Gin. There will be DJs and street food, and it might even be sunny but if not you can always hide in a former dissection room – sounds good to us. 15 & 16 May, 2-7pm and 8pm-1am, 1 Summerhall Pl. Tickets £8, summerhall.co.uk

And finally this month, the Open Jar artists’ collective bring us The Story Behind a Pint of Milk. The collective, who ran a pop-up cafe during last year’s Glasgow International art festival, return with an evening looking at the social, economic and environmental costs that go into a pint of the white stuff. You’ll learn how to make cheese, you’ll discover just what impact your bowl of cereal has on the planet, and you’ll hear from the folk behind the milk. The farmers, we mean, not the cows. There’s some leftfield stuff going on this month, but that might be a bridge too far even for us. 29 May, 5pm, Kinning Park Complex, 43 Cornwall St, Glasgow. Free (ticketed), facebook.com/OpenJarCollective