Great taste of NI foods attract Britain’s top chefs

Specialist cheese, balsamic vinegars, chutney, shortbread, chutney, seaweed seasoning, fudge, savoury sauce, and honey from local producers have been shortlisted for the final later this year.

Previous Northern Ireland winners include Burren Balsamics, Richhill; CRAIC Foods, Craigavon; and Corndale Farm Charcuterie, Limavady.

The Great British Food and Drink Awards, now one of the UK’s most important competitions for smaller producers, were launched in 2014 to celebrate the country's finest artisanal produce, as well as the hard-working people behind the scenes.

This year’s awards are said to be bigger and better than ever, with lots of new categories and amazing celebrity judges including celebrity chefs Raymond Blanc, Michel Roux Jnr and Shaun Rankin. The influential awards provide companies with the opportunity to have their food and drink products taste tested by some of the UK's most acclaimed chefs, food critics and influencers. It’s an exacting process that has often led to new business in Britain for winning companies from here and elsewhere.

The shortlisted products will be sent to a panel of expert judges around the UK for them to pick their gold, silver and bronze winners. The winning product in each category will then be sent to the final expert judge to choose the overall Grand Champion, a title won previously by Armagh’s CRAIC Foods.

Shortlisted companies are: Ballylisk Cheese, Portadown for Triple Rose triple cream cheese; Burren Balsamic, Richhill for vinegars including Bushmills Whiskey Cask Aged Balsamic Vinegar of Modena; Crawford’s Rock, Kilkeel for Coastal Seasoning; Devil’s Churn, Ballycastle for Campfire Caramel Sauce; Granny Shaw’s Confectionery, Ballymena for Crumbly Salted Caramel Fudge; Irish Black Butter, Portrush for Irish Black Butter Sauce; Jackson Roze, Tandragee for ginger wine drinks; Krazibaker, Dromore, for shortbread; and Marshall Beekeeping, Armagh for honey.