The Welbeck Farm Shop has won five of the coveted Great Taste stars as this year’s national awards for food excellence recognised its high welfare, locally-reared lamb and bacon expertly cured in-house by the butchery team.
Out of over 12,300 products to be judged, The Welbeck Farm Shop on the Nottinghamshire-Yorkshire border has been awarded Great Taste stars for its Welbeck Leg of Lamb; Welbeck dry cured smoked back bacon; Welbeck dry cured middle bacon; Welbeck dry cured streaky bacon and its Welbeck own pancetta.
Farm Shop Manager Oliver Stubbins said: “Winning five Great Taste awards is a great achievement for our Butchers. We have previously been awarded Farm Butcher of the year where our overall display, quality and service has been recognised, however we are always looking to improve and have spent a lot of time perfecting our bacon curing, as well as continuing to source the best locally reared high welfare livestock possible.
“Our Butchery team have over 150 years combined experience, led by our Head Butcher Mark, and take great care and passion in preparing all of our produce. Our Butchers hand-cure the finest local pork with our own recipe and it is then aged in the speciality curing room and selected for the counter once the perfect level of aging has been achieved.”
The Welbeck Leg of Lamb was awarded a 2-star Great Taste, with judges calling it a ‘very well produced’ and ‘handsome piece of lamb’ with ‘layers of flavour that just keep giving’. The Farm Shop’s lamb is reared by fifth generation farmers on a 300-year-old unspoilt pasture, known as the wilderness. Sheep graze in a lush, pesticide-free environment giving the meat a wholly distinctive character.
The Welbeck dry cured smoked back bacon is an oak-smoked and dry cured pork loin, hung for a minimum of two weeks in the specialist ageing room. Judges awarded this bacon 1-star calling it ‘thoroughly enjoyable’ with a ‘lovely gentle smoky aroma’.
‘An honest rasher’ and a ‘proper piece of bacon’ was the verdict on the Welbeck dry cured middle bacon combining streaky and back, coming out with another Great Taste 1-star.
The Welbeck dry cured streaky bacon – judged worthy of a Great Taste 1-star – was described as ‘a good looking rasher’ with a ‘delicious porky sweetness with an excellent balance of salt and a light delicate oily finish’.
Judges praised the curing of Welbeck’s own pancetta as ‘sweet and delicious’ with a beautiful caramelisation, creating a product good enough to be eaten by its own, and winning the final Great Taste 1-star.
The unmistakable black and gold Great Taste label is a signpost to a wonderful tasting product, which has been discovered through hours and hours of blind-tasting. Judged by over 500 of the most demanding palates, belonging to food critics, chefs, cooks, restaurateurs and producers, as well as a whole host of food writers and journalists, Great Taste is widely acknowledged as the most respected food accreditation scheme for artisan and speciality food producers.
There were 12,366 Great Taste entries this year and of those products, 165 have been awarded a 3-star, 1,011 received a 2-star and 3,171 were awarded a 1-star accolade. The panel of judges included; chef, food writer and author, Gill Meller, MasterChef judge and restaurant critic, Charles Campion, author and chef, Zoe Adjonyoh, baker, Tom Herbert, and food writer and baking columnist Martha Collison as well as food buyers from Fortnum & Mason, Selfridges, and Harvey Nichols. These esteemed palates have together tasted and re-judged the 3-star winners to finally agree on the 2017 Top 50 Foods, the Golden Fork Trophy winners and the 2017 Supreme Champion.
Great Taste 2017 will reach its exciting finale on Monday 4 September, when the world of fine food gathers at the Intercontinental Park Lane Hotel, London to find out the Golden Fork winners for each region at an Awards Dinner, with the final applause reserved for the Great Taste Supreme Champion 2017.
The Welbeck Farm Shop is open seven days a week. Mon-Sat 10:00am to 5:00pm — Sun 10:00am to 4:00pm. Nestled in the heart of Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire, Welbeck is conveniently located on the A60, just 15 minutes from the A1 and M1.
For more information, visit www.welbeckfarmshop.co.uk
