Haddock & Pak Choi with Tomato & Cashew Sauce

I knew I needed something quick and easy for Friday night's dinner and spotted a recipe on Bim's Kitchen's website which seemed perfect. So I ordered some Haddock (it is better value than cod at the moment) from my fish supplier and some pak choi from my vegetable supplier, and took home a jar of Bim's Kitchen Tomato & Cashew Curry Sauce. Along with a sprinkling of salt and a splash of rapeseed oil, I rustled up a delicious curry in a matter of minutes.  It was so easy, I even had time to take photos as I cooked and tweet a picture of it simmering.

Great Taste Awards Revisited

When I wrote my blog entry about the 2012 Great Taste Awards I intended to add a photo collage of all the winners we stock. I realised it might take me a while, so I published the post with the intention of returning to it later to add the photographs. Twelve months, and forty blog posts, later, and I've still not produced the collage. So I wrote a post about the 2013 award winners. And again I thought a nice collage would be a good idea. For a couple of weeks I really thought I would return to it and add photographs. I really did! But it gradually dawned on me that was not going to happen. I then had another idea. Pinterest! I could make a pinterest board of all our award winners. It still took ages to gather together the images, but I didn't have to worry about the sizes and layout. So here it is, our Great Taste Award Winners 2013!

Great Taste Awards 2013

It's that time of year again when my inbox fills with excited notes from award winning food producers! The winners of the Great Taste Awards 2013 have been announced. Of course our fantastic producers have done fantastically well!

 *** 3 stars

Nearly 10,000 products were entered this year and just 125 were awarded the highest accolade of three stars.

This included Salcombe Dairy's blackcurrant sorbet. Salcombe Dairy also won three stars for their fig and sherry frozen yoghurt which I didn't even know existed. I have, of course, added that to our next order!  They also won one star for our best selling ice cream; Madagascan vanilla.

Azada were awarded three stars for both their virgin hazelnut oil and their virgin almond oil (and one star for virgin walnut oil).

Teapigs won three stars for second year running for their liquorice and peppermint tea.

** 2 stars

Newcomer, Granny's Secret, was awarded two stars for their 100% apricot fruit spread and for their sour cherries. They also received one star for their apricot juice and one star for ayvar, a roasted red pepper dip/spread.

Oro Bailen extra virgin olive oil was again awarded two stars.

Wessex Mill achieved a lot of two star awards. For Wessex Cobber bread flour and mixed grain bread flour and pasta & pizza flour and sunflower bread flour and half & half bread flour (and if that wasn't enough, one star for strong white bread flour). Doves Farm were also awarded two stars for their gluten & wheat free plain white flour.

Once again Tracklements have a collection of two star award winning products. This year, that includes chilli jam, strong horseradish & cream, and new product a beetroot & horseradish relish. They were also awarded one star for each of their roasted cherry tomato relish (another new addition) and fig relish.

Teapigs' chamomile flowers tea was awarded two stars this year (one star last year and the year before) and pure lemongrass tea, was also awarded two stars (as last year). Teapigs' also received one star for their green tea with mint which we have added to our selection this year.

Bessant and Drury's Lemon Ice-Cream was awarded two stars as was Grumpy Mule Panama diamond mountain coffee.

Two of our favourite blue cheeses were also given two stars; the very traditional Colston Bassett Blue Stilton and the very new (and local to us) Rosethorn Blue.

* 1 star

Lots of stars went to relatively new producers this year. Including Artisan Malt Vinegar, Nim's Apple Crisps, Love pickle (Extra Hot), Avlaki's 'Agatherí Groves' oil and Olive Branch's Sun Dried Tomato Paste. Olive Branch were also awarded a gold star for their olive oil.

Bim's Kitchen (new in 2012) won again. This time their African Tomato & Cashew Nut Curry sauce picked up a gold star.  African Bean & Nut Curry Sauce, Baobab Chilli Jam and Spicy African Ketchup all received gold stars last year.

Peppersmith won their first award, for their delicious Lemon Peppermints last year and this year were awarded one star for their Tingz.

Luscombe have been winning awards for their Organic Sicilian Lemonade since I started following the winners back in 2007. They won another gold star this year.

Mike's Smokehouse (another perennial winner) won a hatrick of awards, for Manuka Salmon Pate, Manuka Smoked Duck and Manuka Smoked Chicken.

Pipers Crisps were awarded a gold star for both their Anglesey sea salt crisps (again!) and their  Burrow Hill cider vinegar & sea salt crisps.

Gold stars were also given to Navarrico's delicious giant chickpeas (Garbanzo), The Bay Tree's Marinated Miniature Figs, Brindisa's Tortas de Aceite, with almonds, We Are Tea's

Moroccan Mint

Tea and Copas free range bronze turkeys.

If you are really interested, you can read about who won awards in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012 (part one and part two) in my previous blog posts.

Well done everyone! I knew your products were great and now I have proof!

The list goes on

Still plenty of Great Taste Awards to mention....

Our new supplier Bim's Kitchen received a Gold Star for each of their African Bean & Nut Curry Sauce, Baobab Chilli Jam and Spicy African Ketchup. Mike's smokehouse's brand new smoked tomatoes were also awarded a gold star.

Bessant and Drury were given gold awards for both their lemon and strawberry frozen desserts, when blind tasted with dairy ice creams. An amazing achievement for a dairy free ice-cream.

Susie's Preserves' Raspberry Jam, Henshelwoods' Raspberry and Orange Jam, and seville marmalade with whiskey won gold stars.

Teapigs were awarded a collection of stars, including one each for Darjeeling Earl Grey, Jasmine Pearl Green Tea, Mao Feng Green Tea and Chamomile Flowers. Yogi Tea's Choco Tea also won an award. As did a number of teas from Pukka Herbs, and Campbell's Perfect Tea, again! The coffee award winners included another coffee from Grumpy Mule (who also won a three star award and about half a dozen two stars!).

Gold star were also give to Oliflix Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Anila's Hot Mango Pickle, Stokes Real Tomato Ketchup, Tracklements apricot & ginger chutney, and their fabulous onion marmalade.

Pipers Crisps were awarded a gold star for both their sea salt crisps and sweet chilli crisps. Olives Et Al also won awards for lots of their olives and their Dukkah.

A collection of awards went to local chocolateir L' Auberge du Chocolat and local flour mill Wessex Mill.

Our roast ham from Dorset Farms Ham received a gold star. As did Midfields Granola and Chocolate Peppermint Creams from Summerdown.

Lewis & Cooper's Handmade Luxury Fruit Cake again won a gold star, and again will be stocked by us at Christmas. As will the Copas Sage and Onion stuffing which also won an award (to accompany their 3 star winning turkeys)

I think that is everyone, if I've missed you out, do let me know. This year's list of winners didn't include the product names, so its been a lengthy process checking producer names and product descriptions to try to work out what has won. Please forgive any errors or omissions.

Great Taste Awards 2012

It's time for the Olympics of the food world! The Great Taste Awards results have been announced and yet again, the products available at Tastes Delicatessen have collected lots of awards!

This year 8,807 food and drink products (from more than 2500 producers) were blind-tasted over the course of 45 days by 350 experts. 123 products were awarded three stars, and 50 of those were selected as the Top 50 Foods and Drinks available in Great Britain.

You can read about who won awards in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 in my previous blog posts.

And here are this year's winners.

*** 3 Stars, "Wow you must taste this"
Barkham Blue Cheese, Teapigs' Liquorice and Mint tea and Tracklements' Strong Horseradish & Cream were all awarded three stars and included in the Top 50 Foods list.

Wessex Mill Flour and Copas Turkey were also awarded three stars.

** 2 Stars, "Faultless"
631 products were awarded two stars and included Teapigs Peppermint Leaves and Pure Lemongrass tea, along with Imporient's earl grey.

Oro Bailen Extra Virgin Olive Oil was awarded two stars, continuing their success of gold at The Mario Solinas Extra Virgin Olive Oil Quality Awards.

Tracklements' added to their collection of awards with two stars for their Fig Relish as did Olives et al with their Pistou Olives. Peppersmith won their first award, for their delicious Lemon Peppermints.

Two stars were also award to Salcombe diary Rum and Raisin Ice Cream and Mike's Smokehouse Smoked Salmon Pate - Hot roasted smoked salmon mixed with yoghurt and creme fraiche to maintain a 'homemade' feel to the result.

I'll be back next week with the results of the one star awards!

New Range from Bim's Kitchen

This week we took delivery of a new range from Bim's Kitchen. James "Bim" and Nicola Adedeji produce a unique range of African-inspired products, including hot lemony piri piri sauce, baobab pepper jam, chilli coconut relish, bean and nut curry sauce, and spicy African ketchup.

Last night I sampled the Smoky Baobab BBQ Sauce which we used to marinade some chicken before grilling it. It was delicious! It was also getting dark by the time I took the photo so it is a little grainy!

This week's Beautiful Eton post is an Olympic Special! So will be delayed until the official start of the Olympics tomorrow.