Thame butcher’s bid for glory

TOP-CLASS butchers from Oxfordshire are battling to bag honours in the Q Guild Smithfield Awards, their annual high profile product evaluation competition.

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A total of 479 products from 54 Q butchers nationwide, virtually half of the national membership, have been entered for this year’s sizzling showcase.

There are eight product categories – sausages, burgers, ready to eat meat and roasts, bacon and cured products, pies and bakery – both hot and cold – kitchen ready products, and ready meals, a new addition this year to reflect the great variety of products offered by Guild members.

M Newitt & Sons, of Thame, is well represented with nine products – Oxfordshire Sausage, Gloucestershire Sausage, Green Back Bacon, Smoked Back Bacon, Long Crendon Black Bacon, Long Crendon Black Streaky Bacon, Steak, Ale & Stilton Pie, Steak Pie and Chicken & Ham Pie.

All entrants will be hoping to pick-up gold awards, all of which will qualify for standalone top-rated diamond awards given to individual product category winners, along with EBLEX awards for the best English beef and lamb products, BPEX awards for the best English pork and bacon products, plus Quality Meat Scotland awards for the best Scotch beef and lamb products.

In addition, an overall Smithfield Awards supreme champion will emerge – and earn the bragging rights that go with this ultimate accolade!

Judging by panels of food and meat industry enthusiasts has now taken place and awards will be announced and presented at the Butchers Hall in Smithfield, London, on Thursday, November 13, by Matthew Fort, food and drink editor at the Guardian for over a decade, author of several award-winning books on food, and expert judge on the popular TV series, The Great British Menu.

Product innovation is a key activity in the Q Guild, whose 110 members across Britain are at the elite end of the retail butchery sector.

Q Guild national chairman, West Yorkshire butcher Brindon Addy, said: “The Smithfield Awards are a true and stringent test of the vast variety of products hand-crafted by our members nationwide, who represent the cream of Great British butchery.

“They have an opportunity to win some of the meat industry’s most prized accolades and this year is one of the biggest entries we have had for quite some time.”

SOURCE: Press release