At last those of us who are not sport­ingly inclined have a reas­on to vis­it the Cake Tin, and what a reas­on it is! The annu­al food show is upon us again, and I hope you’ve been train­ing. There really are few things that match drink­ing large amounts of tiny little cups of wine and beer, then stum­bling upon free bacon sand­wiches, drink­ing some more and then com­ing across more bacon sand­wiches. It’s enough to bring tears to the eyes.

As a vet­er­an of at least one sea­son, the Wel­ling­tonista thought we should prob­ably provide some help­ful hints for this mara­thon event.

1. Don’t eat break­fast unless you abso­lutely can­’t leave the house without doing so. You want to make sure you get to try everything at the show, right?
2. Wear extremely com­fort­able shoes. You’re going to be walk­ing for at least four hours if you want to work your way around the whole sta­di­um. If you’re fash­ion con­scious, this prob­ably isn’t the place to care any­way, as you’ll be sur­roun­ded by more sub­urb­an­ites than fooder­ati.
3. Take a back­pack – do not under­es­tim­ate the amount of stuff you will end up buy­ing, espe­cially wine. Remem­ber you’re going to be drunk and caught up in the hype and excite­ment of it all, and there’s noth­ing worse than car­ry­ing plastic shop­ping bags around for four hours.
4. Take the bus or the train to the sta­tion. You’re going to get drunk and you should­n’t need to care about driv­ing after­wards.
5. Don’t make plans for the rest of the night. Chances are you’ll be at wine and cheese explode‑o point and all you’ll be able to do will be lie on the floor altern­at­ing between groan­ing in pain and moan­ing in pleas­ure.
6. Try everything. Even if you’re of the “oh, I grind my own spices to form my own curry paste, I am cul­tur­ally elite” still give the old Wat­ties curry-in-a-tin type stalls a go. They can help to enforce your cul­tur­al superi­or­ity.
7. Get out of my way if you see me. I will be on a mis­sion from Dionysus and you do not want to come between me and free stuff.

The Food Show, Fri­day 12 May – Sunday 14 May, 10am-6pm, West­pac Sta­di­um.