Calling all chocoholics! Ramsbottom will be transformed into chocolate wonderland this weekend!

IF you’ve got a sweet tooth, there’s only one place to be this weekend – Ramsbottom in Lancashire will be transformed into a mouth-watering chocoholic’s heaven for the town’s fifth annual Chocolate Festival.

The two-day event will bring together the UK’s best chocolate-makers and high-quality cocoa products with a huge variety of sweet treats to sample and buy, and a host of activities to keep the children entertained.

Unfortunately I won’t be going this year as I’m elsewhere on a family break – but having been before (and taken part in a Ferrero Rocher World Record attempt!) I can highly recommend a visit on Saturday and Sunday, March 23 and 24.

Since the event was launched in 2009, it’s grown from a few stalls in the town centre to a hugely popular national event, which attracts tens of thousands of visitors every year and last year scooped a Manchester Tourism Award.

I reported on the first-ever festival for the local rag where I worked as a journalist back in 2009.

A self-confessed chocoholic, I thought I’d landed a dream job when I suggested to my editor that I spent the day at the event sampling lots of lovely chocolate and taking part in a Guinness World Record attempt for the most amount of Ferrero Rocher eaten in one minute! (You can read the article here)

It was a little embarrassing and I lost miserably (ironically to a firefighter I now work with!) – but it was a fantastic day and I’m really pleased that the event has got bigger and better every year.

This year’s event will feature a chocolate market on Bridge Street with big names including Slattery, The Chocolate Café and Divine Chocolate.

There’ll be alfresco dining including Tibetan and Thai cuisine, wood-fired pizza, pulled pork, Brazilian street food, Spanish paella, homemade ice-cream and prize-winning ostrich and venison.

Cafes, restaurants and shops in the town will have chocolate specials on their menus and there will be a beer tent, unplugged acoustic music sets, children’s craft sessions and a mini farm.

I won’t be there in person this year but I’ll be there in spirit as I stuff my face with chocolate, eat nice food and drink nice wine in a country lodge in Lincolnshire – not a bad compromise eh?!

Follow @ChocFestival for Twitter updates.

Pictures of previous events taken from www.ramsbottomchocolatefestival.com