Letter from Simon Kelner: Alex's new food festival is anything but charmless

One of Blur's most famous rock anthems is "Country House", a gentle satire about a "City dweller, successful fella" who buys himself a pile in the shires where he "doesn't drink, smoke, laugh" but "takes herbal baths". Sixteen years on, the man who played bass for Blur, Alex James, is himself living the country dream.

He has five children, a sprawling farm in Oxfordshire and has made a second-life name for himself as a award-winning cheese-maker and organic food guru. And, if, in that rather tiresome neologism, food is the new rock 'n' roll, Alex is one of the figures who has helped make it so.

And, to cement his reputation at the vanguard of what we may call roquette 'n' roll, Alex has just staged a live festival, Harvest, on his land; one which he describes as a food festival with music, rather than the other way round.

So the real rock stars of the event were not The Kooks or KT Tunstall, but Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall and Yotam Ottolenghi and i's house chef, Mark Hix. And all around the site were food outlets that were as far from the standard festival fare of greasy burgers and hot dogs as it was possible to be. You could get grilled halloumi wraps, chorizo stew, piripiri chicken, hand-made pizzas and barley risotto. (Nevertheless, I couldn't help noticing that the queue for fish and chips was much longer than the one at the salad bar.) You could drink blush cider or any number of real ales.

Dave and Sam - who live within cheese-rolling distance - paid a visit.

Jeremy Clarkson, another local, was holding court. And children - called Tom, Milo or Monty and often referred to by their parents as "poppet" - played among the hay bales. It was very much the Cotswold classes at play and none the worse for that. What I found remarkable, however, was the reverence with which the gathering treated their food heroes. It was blowing a gale, but there they were, wrapped in Barbours or quilted coats, hanging on Ottolenghi's every word. "The fennel is looking gorgeous," he said, to a low murmur of appreciation from the hundreds watching. There were "oohs" and "mmms" throughout, they laughed at all his "jokes" and when he finished, he was cheered to the echo.

What's he going to do for an encore, I wondered? Make a couscous? As day turned to night and the smell of dozens of different food groups wafted in the cold air, I had only one thought: if food be the music of love, play on!