Bradford's food festival will be serving up some tasty treats when it returns for another helping later this year.

Festival organisers yesterday announced plans to hold the city's second festival in September and are hoping to feature some celebrity names on this year's menu.

Festival spokesman Simon Dunn said he was hoping to build on the success of the inaugural event.

He said: "Last year went really well. I think we attracted about 6,000 people to the various events over ten days and that's not bad considering we coincided with the petrol crisis and bus strikes. We'll be hoping to improve on that this year.

"The highlight of the festival will again be the cookery theatre where there will be demonstrations by top chefs and cooking challenges.

"But instead of holding it in Centenary Square like we did last year we'll be holding it inside the Hilton Hotel. It will be warmer!

"We've got our fingers crossed that we can attract some celebrity chefs such as Brian Turner or Andrew Nutter to come and do some demonstrations."

Mr Dunn said that backing from Bradford Council had helped convince him to hold a second festival.

He said: "I think the Council believes in the food festival and sees it as a vital part of its culture bid for 2008. We're also going to hold a hospitality fair as part of the festival to open the event out to the business community."

Lord Mayor Stanley King, who helped this year's event get off to a frying start at the Wetherby Whaler restaurant in Pudsey, said he hoped the festival would boost Bradford's bid for the European City of Culture title.

At the launch Councillor King was presented with a £200 cheque for his Brainwave appeal raised after a giant Easter egg was auctioned at last year's festival.

He said: "The festival has certainly aroused a lot of interest and I think things like this can only help our City-of-Culture bid.

"We need to breathe new life into the city and things like the food festival are great ways to do it."