Sheffield food festival 2024: I buy food at the quietest stalls at the market out of guilt, and that's okay

Call this a confession, a therapy session, or just a plea for validation. Maybe I want someone to read this and quietly note they feel the same. Either way, it’s a pattern of behaviour that’s not going to stop here.

My name’s Alastair, and I support stalls at markets out of guilt.

Today’s anecdote is about Sheffield Food Festival 2024, but let’s be forward - it’s been like this my whole adult life.

Countless coffees I only sort of wanted ordered from cafes because I saw staff leaning their chin in their hand through the window. Stocking fillers bought at Christmas Market stalls from despondent-looking men selling homemade liquor I plan to palm off on my dad. Every pay day I buy disparate nerd nonsense from bit-of-everything geek stores I feel are too out the way for their own good. I mean, I bought a way-too-big-for-my-indoor-plants watering can the other day because the man’s shop was a complete mess. It wasn’t even the right colour, I was looking for a yellow one.

It’s with this mindset I went to Sheffield Food Festival on May 25 to make a video for The Star and the straightforward promise to only get some lunch I could claim back on expenses. I spent £35.

Good, now that’s off my chest. My other confession is, this weekend, I’ve decided this is totally fine and I’m not going to stop.

Yes, while wandering Sheffield Food Festival, that guilty instinct emerged again and led to some errant card tapping at some of its quietest stalls. Here’s how they were all a great time anyway.

I started by buying a bag of freeze-dried Skittles. It cost £5 I maybe didn’t want to part with from a man who spoke to me first, and no one else was at the stall. They’re called Sweet Corner 242 and they deal in freeze dried branded sweets. “Like astronaut food,” he insisted.

I thought it was kooky nonsense, but I liked his gumption, so why not.

And you know what? They taste mind blowing. Whatever this space man has done to his Skittles, they now taste twice as intense. I took them to a hang out with a friend that night and they were a hit. Well done SweetCorner242, you’re on to something here, I’ll be back to try your freeze dried... Flumps?

There’s a sight I see at nearly every food market I’ve ever been to - a stall selling brownies and cookies doing gangbusters, and another stall selling brownies and cookies directly next to it with no punters at all. It was the same at one corner of Sheffield Food Market.

I didn’t really want the coffee cake slice I bought, it was too late to get out the conversation when I realised it was vegan (which I dislike in cakes), and I didn’t want to spend £4 on it.

What I did do was eat it in three big bites as soon as I got a taste, and I really enjoyed said conversation with the bright and cheerful seller when we got talking, and waved off the £4 as supporting a business other than Caffe Nero. Happy days.

Next was buying a - cough, splutter - £10 roll from La Porketta. I’ve got to the point I refuse to buy the £12 (and increasing!) Yorkshire Pudding Wraps at any and all Christmas Markets each year, because the queues are around the block. But this particular pulled-pork purveyor had porchetta. The Italian king of meats I’ve never had the chance to try. And better yet, not one other person was in the queue. So I bought in and I refuse to regret this one - it was warm, juicy, a little spicy and served in an absolutely crammed torpedo roll. I must have looked a pig eating it I was so happy.

I want to clarify something here when I say no one else was in the queue at La Porketta, in case it paints Sheffield Food Festival 2024 as some ghost town. The Peace Gardens, Pinstone Street and all the way to The Moor were fizzing with hundreds of families and friends on Saturday afternoon. I don’t even know why the stalls I mention here weren’t as busy as their neighbours, because all three were a treat and priced the same as anything else. But markets are a chance to try something you might not normally pick.

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Then a coffee here, a brownie to take home there... £35 gone in an hour. Not what I planned. I even forgot the receipts. so I can’t even claim the expenses as planned.

Anyway, I don’t feel guilty now it’s done. It’s certainly not good to project imagined notions onto strangers that they are all quietly disappointed with the day and desperate for a sale. On reflection, it does them a dishonour. So if I can get that little neurosis under control, I can justify this habit with a whole new rationale; a sale is a sale and you should live it up a little.

Critics will probably say this is why I and my generation can’t save and don’t own houses - also known as Sam Levin ‘Stop Buying Avocado on Toast’ treatise. Well, the housing market is a racket and a bubble, and I eat peanut butter sandwiches for lunch every single day to save money. Support your local tad-too-quiet business today.