Preview // 10 Awesome Things To Do In Northern Ireland This Week / 14 – 20 January

We’re back for 2019 and kicking things off with the weekly look at what’s good around the province. The awesome guys at the tourist board know there are stacks of fun things to do across NI, from family days out to gigs and cultural events every week. So here are their top 10 exciting things taking place this week (14 – 20 January)

1. Out to Lunch Festival, Belfast, 4 – 27 January. Now in its fourteenth year, this festival specialises in lunch-based art solutions in the Cathedral Quarter and beyond. This year’s festival boasts a jam-packed line-up including Britain’s Got Talent’s Lost Voice Guy and DJ Terri Hooley. To see the full line-up visit CQAF.com.
2. Tutored Whiskey Tasting Evening, Belfast, 17 January. Learn more about Northern Ireland’s oldest whiskey producer Bushmills with a tutored tasting session at the Crown Bar, sampling Old Bushmills original, Black Bush, 10yr single malt, 16yr single malt, and 21yr single malt as well as their latest whiskey The Sexton. 
3. Art in the Orchard, Portadown, 19 January. Join professional visual artist Deborah Malcomson for a unique day of creativity at Long Meadow Farm. This will be a unique opportunity to get out into the orchards and enjoy the challenge of producing your own creative response to the surrounding apple trees.
4. Coming Home: Art and the Great Hunger, Derry~Londonderry, 19 January – 16 March. Coming Home: Art and the Great Hunger, the acclaimed Famine art collection, currently on loan from Ireland’s Great Hunger Museum at Quinnipiac University will be on display at Cultúrlann Uí Chanáin.
5. ‘If You Can Find Me’ : A celebration of the music of Stephen Sondheim, Newry, 17 January.  A celebration of the music of Stephen Sondheim. Newry Chamber Music continues its 2018/19 season with a concert featuring rising stars from the Northern Ireland Opera Studio Artists programme.
6. Brahms’s 2nd Piano Concerto, Belfast, 18 January. Performed by soloist pianist Boris Giltburg, Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto opens gently, but as it unfolds and expands it brings the impressive concert to a richly romantic close at the Ulster Hall.
7. I Love Burns Night!, Belfast, 19 January. Join the Ulster Orchestra and friends at the Waterfront Hall for a ceilidh’s-worth of toe-tapping jigs, reels and, of course, the songs and poetry of ‘The Bard’ himself, Robert Burns! The Orchestra’s annual Burns Night concert is the ultimate celebration of the cultural links between Scotland and Northern Ireland.
8. Traditional Irish Bread Making, Killinchy, 19 January. Join NI Food Tours in an 18th century thatched cottage on the shores of Strangford Lough for a truly authentic traditional Irish bread making experience.
9. A Costume Cavalcade, Armagh, until 2 March 2019.  This exhibition at the Armagh County Museum tells the story of dress over the last three hundred years showcasing some of the most important examples in the collection.
10. Close To Home, Limavady, until 25 January. Roe Valley Arts host this exhibition of work by artists of the Puffin Artists Group CIC co-ordinated by the lovely Puffin Gallery in Ballycastle and including works in ceramics, glass, paintings, jewellery and more.