Margaret River Gourmet Escape – Turns Out, Nigella Lawson Hates Pineapple on Pizza

The Margaret River Gourmet Escape Festival is ready for action in the heart of Western Australian food and wine land this weekend.

Part of the festivities kicked off at the new, opulent Crown Towers Hotel, a six-star resort overlooking the Swan River westward toward Perth City.

Some of the names to grace the Margaret River Gourmet Escape festival include Nigella, along with Rick Stein – a TV presenter and celeb Chef and Dominique Crenn.

Crenn is regarded as one of the world’s premier Chefs. In fact, she was crowned the World’s “Best Female Chef” for 2016. She is also famous for her time on Netflix series, Chef’s Table.

Stein has been producing TV programs for years and is Head Chef and co-owner of “Rick Stein at Bannisters” at Mollymook, New South Wales. He also owns four restaurants in Padstow, a fish and chip shops in Cornwall, England. He has written a number of cookery books and has presented on television programmes over several decades.

In Perth WA with @Sasstein on way to @GourmetEscapes, doing a barbeque on the beach and dinner at Evans and Tate Winery with @JackStein — Rick Stein (@Rick_Stein) November 16, 2016

The program’s biggest star, Nigella Lawson, was drafted in to help launch the festival. As part of a media deal, Channel 7’s Sunrise program was there for a slice of the action.

After a somewhat philosophical and emotional discussion centring on passionate foodie culture, the high level discourse between Nigella, Rick and Dominique was broken by a classically Australian disruptive question from local funnyman, Sam Mac.

The TV program’s weather dude was there to jump-in on the panel of foodie legends – he asked the rather unsophisticated question to Nigella… “Pineapple on Pizza? Yes or No?”

Nigella repsonded, “For me, never.”

Nigellas answer went on to refer to her late husband John’s love of pizza, but she quickly settled on a more diplomatic answer… “Im ready to give it another go,” she said.

The WA State Government had drafted Nigella into promote the food and wine festival, part of a big export push to ensure Western Australia plays a central part in the push for high end tourism and cosmopolitan foodie travel culture. A number of incredibly food and wine professionals will lead the 2016 Gourmet Escape Festival – a food love affair like no other in Australia.

Sunrise crashes the Margaret River Escape Launch

See the full event video replay

The cast of local, national and international Chefs and food professionals to grace the festival in 2016:

The chefs available are:

INTERNATIONALS

Ana Ros

Andoni Luis Aduriz

Ashley Palmer-Watts

Dominique Crenn

David Thompson

Janice Wong

Isaac McHale

Mauro Colagreco

Riccardo Camanini

Tony Conigliaro

Australia Wide

Analiese Gregory

Andrew McConnell

Angel Fernandez

Darren Robertson

Lennox Hastie

Mike McEnearney

Mitch Orr

Nelly Robinson

Ross Lusted

Scott Pickett



Western Australia

Aaron Carr

Dan Masters

Dany Angove

George Cooper

Haleigh Troy

Iain Robertson

Jed Gerrard

Josh Whiteland

Ollie Gould

Paul Pskov

Scott Bridger

Seth James

Tony Howell

“Life doesn’t get much better than this…Honestly, I don’t think that there is any other food event on this planet like this.” Heston Blumenthal, Chef & Restaurateur | The Fat Duck & Dinner by Heston, UK – Quote