Taste Awards 2011: An opportunity to be a winner

FOOD producers and food lovers are invited to be part of our annual celebration of Yorkshire food and drink.

The Yorkshire Post Taste Yorkshire Food Awards 2011, in association with the York Food & Drink Festival, aims to applaud the people who make a living from growing and baking and brewing and producing worldclass foodstuffs.

All the Taste Awards winners will be announced at a dinner at York Guildhall, at the climax to the York festival, which runs at various venues in the city from September 16. The awards are open to food producers from anywhere within the county who sell their foods commercially. There is no entry fee.

There are six judged categories:

Butchers and meat.

Dairy

Growers

Handmade ( jams, pickles, chocolates, etc)

Local brew

Pies

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There is also a Reader Award. During the festival the public is invited to tastings of all the products that are shortlisted for the awards and then invited vote for the one they think is the best.

The winners of the six judged categories are decided by a panel headed by Michael Hjort, the director of the York Food Festival. Michael is an independent chef restaurateur of Melton’s and Melton’s Too, in York.

If you are a producer and would like to enter the Taste Awards, this is what to do: Enter quickly and easily online via the Yorkshire Post website at www. yorkshire post. co. uk/ taste

Alternatively, telephone 0113 238 8956 to request an entry form by post. Your entry will state who you are, what your product is, where it is sold, why you think you should win. The deadline for entries is Tuesday, July 19. The email address, if required, is michael. hickling@ ypn. co. uk

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Postal entries, marked Taste Yorkshire, should be sent to Michael Hickling, Yorkshire Post, Wellington Street, Leeds, LS1 1RF. These initial entries will be filtered down by the judges to a shortlist of 10 in each category. If yours is successful, you will be asked to send in your product – or a small range of products – for the judges’ tasting session in August.

The finalists, three in each category, will be published in CountryWeek towards the end of August, and the winners will be announced at the splendid and convivial awards dinner at the York Guildhall on September 23.

The menu this year is designed to highlight the produce of previous winners:

Salad of Poached Egg (Ian Taylor’s Free Range Eggs) with locally grown organic leaves and dressed with Yorkshire Rapeseed Oil

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Blanquette of Veal (from Taste Tradition) with green herbs and late summer vegetables

Selection of Cheese from Shepherd’s Purse and Lowna Dairy. Almond and Apple Slice with Raisethorpe Manor Raspberry Gin The price per head is £45.

This event will be followed by two pages of coverage in Country Week on the winners and runners-up and their products.

If you have any queries relating to the awards, please phone 0113 238 8956 to speak to Michael Hickling.

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The rules: All Taste Award entry forms must be submitted to the Yorkshire Post by July 19.

Entrants should be producers, not retailers, who make their goods in Yorkshire.

The products must be commercially available at the time of entry. The judges’ decision will be final.

The Awards Dinner on September 23 is at York Guildhall ( off St Helen’s Square).

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York Food and Drink Festival from September 16 -25, set in and around the city’s many offers free entry to the markets, demonstration area, beer tent and information point, with a marquee in Parliament Street the focus point.

Then there’s day time and evening programme of events in York Guildhall and other venues. This year the theme is Dine at My Table involving diverse venues, cultures and personalities to be found in the city.

The first is a unique opportunity to dine at the table of the Lord Mayor of York. A four course black tie dinner will be provided by the Feversham Arms from Helmsley for the meal in the splendid 18th century Mansion House.