Little Table of Delights: Show Review

The Little Table of Delights

Yeo Valley Canteen

Tuesday 27^th October 2015

The Practically Perfect team has had a fair bit of experience of reviewing theatre shows, but I have to say that Tuesday night’s performance of The Little Table of Delights was really something else. For starters, it wasn’t actually performed in a theatre but in the charmingly rustic canteen at Yeo Valley headquarters in Blagdon, Somerset.

Instead of a stage, dozens of attentive little diners/audience members were seated around an enormous banquet table, enraptured by stories and songs about the stages our food and drink go through before they’re ready for us to consume.

Each of the five acts covers a different story of food provenance, at the end of which the actors-cum-waiters serve the children with tasters of the stars of the show: olive bread, beetroot, spices, cheese and honey (ice cream). So far that all sounds quite educational, which of course it is, but The Little Table of Delights is also a little decadent and quite bonkers too.

To the delight of the children, Bristol-based company Theatre Damfino, along with professional chef, Claire Thomson (pictured above) and author of 5 o’Clock Apron, perform magic tricks, poke a talking ‘decapitated head’ up through the middle of the dining table, catapult an egg across the room and take every possible opportunity to climb up and use the lengthy table as a stage or a catwalk. The youthful audience was captivated by Tuesday’s energetic performance and there was a fair bit of laughter from their grown ups too!

One of my favourite lines describes the tale of two beetroots in love

“Never before had two beets’ hearts beat like this before.” 

You too can sample this crazy, funny, interactive theatrical tasting next at The Egg Theatre in Bath and then at The Print Room in Notting Hill.

The Little Table of Delights is recommended for children aged 5-12

More information on the show can be found Theatre Damfino’s Website