ANOTHER bank holiday weekend approaches and I am personally hoping for the chance to have a family barbecue; in other words hot sun please.

It was wonderful to have asparagus alongside a Plenty Pie followed by strawberries and cream on Saturday night and a hot weekend barbecue this bank holiday would be a great way to start the summer.

With Adey’s Farm, Frocester Fayre, Madgetts and Hinton Marsh farm supplying the pork, beef, lamb and poultry there is such a great array of produce for the barbie - chops, steaks, ribs, marinaded pieces of chicken, bangers galore and burgers, all from producers you can trust.

Although growing strawberries, tomatoes and cucumbers in tunnels or under glass, sometimes even heated, is not the greenest way to produce crops, I’m sure regulars are delighted to have access to some salad crops.

Judging from the queue at Over Farm last Saturday, who had mainly tomatoes and asparagus, I'd say I wasn’t the only one enjoying them.

I love sliced tomatoes heavily peppered and drizzled with balsamic vinegar myself and that was also on the menu alongside the pie and asparagus.

Just to complete the picture for you we also drank organic lager from Stroud Brewery.

This Saturday will see Paget’s bunch carrots, Alderton Nurseries flat beans and aubergines and Besley’s strawberries alongside a host of other exciting foods.

Wil’s Smokehouse, Neustift Goat Dairy, Must Have Muffins, the Cotswold Curer, Three Counties Liquers, Jonathan Crump cheeses, Days Cottage apple juice and cider and beers from Gloucester and Corinium Breweries.

On the crafts front Liz Dart Stained Glass will be making the first appearance of a new monthly slot on the first Saturday of the month and will have a range of window hangings for sale as well as being available for commission work.

Other crafts this week include Rupert’s Pottery, Cloth and Clay, Taena Pottery and Lansdown Pottery.

Taena Pottery produces a wide range of hand-thrown, slip-decorated domestic earthenware.

A small, family run pottery, it makes pressed dishes, terracotta flower-pots, hanging planters and oil-burners. Other specially commissioned items such as house-name plaques and commemorative plates are also produced to individual requirements. Based in Upton St Leonards, the Taena Pottery was founded in 1948 by Loo Groves in the Forest of Dean. Loo was a pupil of Margaret Leach, who had a pottery at Brockwear. Margaret had been trained at St Ives by Bernard Leach (no relation).