FFD April 2015

DELI OF THE MONTH 52

A PINCH OF SALT 23

With Nigel Chandler of Garsons Farm Shop in Esher, Surrey

Alan Bartlett on his charcuterie tie-up with James Golding, chefdirector of The Pig hotels

ELECTION SPECIAL 11

We take views on who deserves to win the food business vote

April 2015 · Vol 16 Issue 3

COLD COMFORT Ice creams, sorbets and frozen yoghurts to refresh your summer stock-list CHEF’S SELECTION 45 Marcus McGuinness of Auberge du Lac tips his hat to Capreolus airdried ham, St Helen’s Farm goats’ butter and Dr Burnorium’s Psycho Juice

OUTDOOR DINING 33 From pizza stones to smokers and wood-fired ovens, there’s more to summer food than a blazing BBQ

NEWS CHEESEWIRE ICE CREAM FREE-FROM FOODS PREVIEW: NATURAL PRODUCTS EUROPE SHELF TALK

4 17 27 39 43 45

Sunday 21 June 11am-4pm Monday 22 June 9.30am-4pm Halls 1 & 2, Yorkshire Event Centre HG2 8PW

Register for your free ticket to visit the north’s largest food trade show www.gff.co.uk/harrogate

“Harrogate Fine Food Show is the reason why regional food shows are so important. The show offers an exciting and efficient way for buyers, from all sectors of the trade, to see first-hand what’s new and where the next big launch might be coming from.”

Scott Winston, Harrods

Harrogate Fine Food Show combines first-time and long-standing exhibitors. As a visitor you will get to meet new producers and taste products that will have never been seen before at a trade show. Come and discover food and drink that will make your shop, restaurant, café or pub a more interesting place to visit.

Featuring this year: Feed the Dragon: producers pitch to big-name food buyers Cracking Christmas: retailer’s workshop to maximise sales Fine Food Live! Theatre: Demos & tutored tastings hosted by radio’s Nigel Barden Expert advice & support from the Guild of Fine Food Great Taste: sample many award-winners Deliciouslyorkshire@Harrogate Fine Food Show

WHO SHOULD VISIT: delis, farmshop, foodhalls, garden centres, pubs & restaurants, hotels, cafes & coffee shops, butchers, bakers, high-end grocers, heritage & gift shops Easy access and free parking. Under 18s will not be admitted. Students by prior arrangement only

www.gff.co.uk |

@guildoffinefood | #harrogateffs

opinion

What’s new this month:

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products on site, including jarred ere’s a statement to make a preserves, Castle is even more few FFD readers choke on direct than Chandler. He says that, their morning coffee. “Jam is to an extent, suppliers have “only a traditional product. Old people are themselves to blame” if he takes dying and young people don’t want back shelf-space for higher-margin to buy jam.” stuff made in-house. There’s little That’s Nigel Chandler, manager innovation in ambient foods, he of the £3m-a-year Garsons farm says, and anything that’s any good shop in Surrey, talking to me for this soon pops up in Waitrose. What’s month’s Deli of the Month (p52). more, he accuses distributors of It’s worrying on a number of failing to pass on promotional levels, especially since Garsons is offers from suppliers. And he says not only based on the UK’s biggest that, while the price shoppers will pick-your-own farm, popular pay for a jar of jam has a hit a with home jam-makers, but has a ceiling of around £3.99, cost prices substantial garden centre on the same site. If you can’t sell jam to gardeners For the producer, failing to and preserve fans, who pass on rising costs is a mug’s can you sell it to? game, but so is churning out the In truth, Garsons same stuff year after year if the is still selling plenty of jams, marmalades market is changing and pickles. However, are continuing to creep upwards, takings are down and ambient whittling away at the shop’s margin. goods have become Chandler’s Of course, there are two sides single biggest headache, while most to this story. For the producer, of the growth is coming from fresh failing to pass on rising input costs deli goods and bakery. is a mug’s game and ultimately And the same is being said unsustainable. But so too is by other big farm shop operators, churning out the same stuff year Chandler told me, suggesting I after year when the market is have a word with Paul Castle at changing. the ever-expanding Farrington farm At the very least, distributors shop in Somerset. I should be passing on promotions. did exactly that, Failing to support farm shops is and you can read not smart when these are the very Castle’s views outlets that have been delivering on the ambient growth over the past decade. market in this Producers complain they can’t issue (p8). With survive on the half-dozen jars or Farrington’s bottles sold by a typical high street now deli each month. They need to be making listening more closely to the needs many of what is currently the speciality of its market’s most vibrant sector. own

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MICK WHITWORTH Editor

EDITORIAL

GENERAL ENQUIRIES

editorial@gff.co.uk

Tel: 01747 825200 Fax: 01747 824065 info@gff.co.uk www.gff.co.uk

Editor: Mick Whitworth Deputy editor: Michael Lane Art director: Mark Windsor Editorial production: Richard Charnley Contributors: Nick Baines, Clare Hargreaves, Patrick McGuigan, Lynda Searby

ADVERTISING advertise@gff.co.uk Sales manager: Sally Coley Advertisement sales: Becky Stacey, Ruth Debnam Published by Great Taste Publications Ltd and the Guild of Fine Food Ltd Managing director: John Farrand Marketing director: Tortie Farrand Chairman: Bob Farrand Director: Linda Farrand Operations & Guild membership: Charlie Westcar, Karen Price, Jilly Sitch, Claire Powell Accounts: Stephen Guppy, Denise Ballance, Julie Coates

Guild of Fine Food, Guild House, 23b Kingsmead Business Park, Shaftesbury Road, Gillingham, Dorset SP8 5FB United Kingdom Fine Food Digest is published 11 times a year and is available on subscription for £45pa inclusive of post and packing.

Printed by: Blackmore, Dorset, UK © Great Taste Publications Ltd and The Guild of Fine Food Ltd 2015. Reproduction of whole or part of this magazine without the publisher’s prior permission is prohibited. The opinions expressed in articles and advertisements are not necessarily those of the editor or publisher. The publisher cannot accept responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photographs or illustrations.

For regular news updates from the industry's favourite magazine visit:

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Editor’s choice

Selected by MICHAEL LANE Deputy editor

Womersley’s new recipe fruit vinegars www.womersleyfoods.com

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Womersley went through a tough time in the autumn of 2013 when it suddenly lost its production partner in Yorkshire but MD Rupert Parsons steered the family business out of trouble and into a new arrangement in Somerset.

Now he has revamped what’s on the inside and the outside of the bottle. The new “fruitier” recipes have curbed the sweetness but still pack the requisite punch and zing that has made them a favourite with Great Taste judges over the years.

The decision to switch the smaller 100ml bottles from their previous tall shape to a more compact design should boost the range’s shelf appeal for consumers and retailers alike.

Parsons is also looking to promote the vinegars’ many other uses – beyond salad dressings – with a new website packed with recipe ideas.

These vinegars are well worth trying out if they don’t grace your shelves already.

p45

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Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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fine food news New legislation for mandatory on-pack nutritional info could mean another packaging overhaul

Further labelling regs changes could hit producers’ bottom line

By PATRICK McGUIGAN

It’s only been a few months since many artisan producers had to revamp their packaging to meet allergen labelling rules, but they may have to do it all over again with new regulations on providing nutritional information coming into force next year.

Food manufacturers were obliged under the EU’s provision of Food Information to Consumers (FIC) regulation to provide allergen information on labels from December 13 last year. The change in the law was overseen by the Food Standards Agency, but another less publicised part of the legislation, which is being overseen by the Department of Health (DoH), will make it mandatory for pre-packed food and drink to carry nutritional information on labels from December 13 2016.

While nutritional values are printed on most supermarket products, they are much less common

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It would have been a lot easier and cheaper if we’d known about this beforehand.

We could have included nutritional values at the same time as changing our packaging for allergen labelling.

Natasha Gruzina, Seriously Italian

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In addition to recently enforced rules on allergen details, the EU’s Food Information to Consumers law will also require prepacked foods to carry nutritional information from December 13 2016

in the fine food sector and artisan producers now face further expense to get products analysed and to change packaging once again.

“This is really unfair on smaller producers, it means double the cost,” said Natasha Gruzina, co-owner of London-based Seriously Italian, whose handmade pastas and pesto sauces currently do not carry nutritional information. “It would have been a lot easier and cheaper if we’d known about this beforehand. We could have included nutritional values at the same time as changing our packaging for allergen labelling. We pay a charge of £30-£90 every time we change anything on the printing plate, which soon adds up when you have lots of different product lines. ” The situation is confusing because producers of “small quantities” of food supplying “local” retailers could be exempt from the new regulation, but these terms have not been clearly defined at a European or national level (see box below), leaving companies in limbo.

“It’s just extraordinary that it’s

such a mess,” said Julian Warrender, owner of Sussex preserves company Ouse Valley Foods. “We have decided to wait until we get definitive clarification before we change our packaging. Because we have such a big range changing the labels is complicated. We don’t want to do it twice [after complying with new allergen laws] if we don’t have to.”

She added that the company would need at least six months to comply with the new regulations.

Food and labelling consultant Bob Salmon, founder of Food Solutions, said he was not confident in how the DoH would handle implementation of the new requirements.

“Ninety per cent of restaurants didn’t know about allergen labelling so I dread to think what the DoH are going to do with nutritional

Crunching the numbers Food producers have two main options when it comes to calculating the nutritional content of their products, both of which come at a cost.

Labs charge £80-£120 per product for nutritional analysis, but this is an expensive option for companies that have dozens of lines and regularly changing recipes.

Another option is to invest in software like NutriCalc, which features a database of ingredients and automatically calculates nutritional values when quantities are input for recipes. Its XF3 programme costs £945. The company also calculates values for individual products, from £35. labelling,” he said. “They really need to pull their finger out pretty soon to give people enough time.”

Jo Scott, director at labelling consultancy Strawberry Standards, said that whether a producer would be exempt or not was missing the point “If a business is going to grow, it’s an investment they need to make.

People expect nutritional information now.”

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It’s just extraordinary that it’s such a mess. We have decided to wait until we get definitive clarification before we change our packaging.

Julian Warrender, Ouse Valley Foods

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Under the EU’s FIC regulation all packaged foods and drinks must declare the following items on their labels by 13 December 2016: energy value in both kilojoules and kilocalories; plus the amounts in grams of fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, protein and salt.

Some foods are exempt from mandatory nutrition labelling. This includes “hand-crafted food directly supplied by the manufacturer of small quantities of products to the final consumer or to local retail establishments directly supplying the final consumer”.

The definitions of these terms have been left to individual member states to decide. In the UK “local” is likely to mean within 30 miles, while there is still no definition of what is meant by “small quantities”.

“We are clarifying with the Commission

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

whether the exemption relates only to small businesses or to particular product lines produced in small quantities, regardless of the size of the business,” a DoH spokesperson told FFD. “Once there is greater clarity over this issue, we will establish a definition of ‘small quantities’ in consultation with other government departments and the devolved administrations.

Once this is agreed, we will include a definition of both ‘small quantities’ and ‘local’ in updated technical guidance.”

Other products that will be exempt include: non-packaged foods; unprocessed or ‘matured’ products that comprise a single ingredient (eg, meat); water; herbs; vinegars; salt; coffee; and teas. Products with labels that are smaller than 25cm2 are also exempt.

Food accreditation scheme Salsa is running

www.origincoffee.co.uk

What the new rules do (and don’t) say

a series of workshops throughout 2015 to help small producers comply with the new labelling regulation. www.salsafood.co.uk

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Guild seeks sponsors for ‘Master of Cheese’ qualification

IN BRIEF l Cheese-maker Quickes has hired Mark Hindle for the new role of UK account manager. Hindle previously ran a chain of cheese shops with partner Karen before working as a cheese-maker at Herefordshire’s Monkland Cheese Dairy.

By MICK WHITWORTH

The Guild of Fine Food is seeking £25,000 in trade sponsorship to fund development of a European version of the Certified Cheese Professional (CCP) qualification run in the United States by the American Cheese Society (ACS).

The CCP, launched in 2012, is considered the equivalent of the globally admired Master of Wine qualification, overseen by the UK’s Wine & Spirit Education Trust. Only 200 people so far hold the US cheese qualification.

It is aimed chiefly at specialist cheesemongers who have worked in the sector for several years and can prove a deep knowledge, both of the product and the supply chain that takes it from dairy to consumer.

Its development in the US has been heavily backed by Whole Foods Market, which has over 350 sites and aspires to have a CCP-qualified expert working in every shop.

The effort to bring a CCP equivalent to Britain has been driven

by Mary Quicke of farmhouse cheesemaker Quickes Traditional, along with Guild managing director John Farrand.

Paxton & Whitfield and distributor Harvey & Brockless (formerly Cheese Cellar) are among those who have joined a steering group to move the project forward.

In the US, candidates have a once-a-year opportunity to sit a CCP examination at the annual ACS conference. There is no formal study package, but the ACS has a number of ‘approved educators’ to help candidates amass the necessary knowledge, with help from courses and visits to cheese-makers.

John Farrand said the ACS was fully supporting the development of an EU version of CCP, geared to European cheeses and to the very different supply chain on this side of the Atlantic. It will be sharing some of its intellectual property with the Guild, so the European CCP will not have to be developed from scratch.

The Guild is now seeking industry backers to fund customisation of the US learning materials, production of an EU learning guide, promotion and project management of the course, with five £5,000 sponsorship packages available.

Companies interested in supporting the project should email john.farrand@gff.co.uk in the first instance.

WHOLESALE CHANGES: Multi-award-winning Somerset farm shop Farrington’s is to begin wholesaling a selection of products from among the 300-plus lines made in its in-house kitchens.

“We've got approved kitchen status, and we'll be putting 150 of the products we currently produce for the shop into our first wholesale catalogue,” business manager Paul Castle told FFD. “We’re doing everything from jars of jam and chutney to sausage rolls, pork pies, quiches, ready-meals, salads, tray-bakes and sponges – so it’s a fairly mixed bag. We believe we will be the only people offering that breadth of product from an artisan supplier.”

Castle said Farrington’s would be targeting premium outlets such as “food-concious delis that want something fresh and local, and tourist attractions that want something better than mass-catering products.”

• Read Paul Castle’s Viewpoint on faltering ambient food sales – page 8.

Cheese Cellar restructures and rebrands as Harvey & Brockless

By MICHAEL LANE

Producer and distributor Cheese Cellar has reverted to its original trading name, Harvey & Brockless, and rebranded to reflect the nature of its multi-category business.

The company, which has traded in various guises since the 1970s, will keep the Cheese Cellar name for its dairy brand alongside its Mediterranean deli foods brand Dell’Ami and food manufacturing arm Huge Sauce.

Harvey & Brockless will be the company’s trading name but all of its previous brands, including Cheese Cellar, and divisions will be retained.

Cheese Cellar will now be split into three divisions. Cheese Cellar Artisan will cover wholesaling of cheeses from British and Continental artisan makers while Cheese Cellar Dairy will be responsible for the company’s own farmhouse cheeses made at Bromhall Farm in Worcester.

All other cheese and dairy products will be handled by Cheese Cellar Essentials while any other speciality foods – such as Ponthier chilled fruit purées and Valrhona chocolate – will be handled by a separate section of the company.

Since it was first bought by Frank Day in 1970, Harvey & Brockless has grown from a small Sussex cheese wholesaler into a nationwide business with 400 staff.

It has been through several names changes, including H & B Food Ltd and The Huge Cheese Company, before being bought by an Icelandic business in 2006.

It was subsequently bought back by its three directors – Jonnie Archer, Nick Martin and Simon Yorke (Frank Day’s step-grandson) – in 2009 before adopting the Cheese Cellar name. Nicky Philp was promoted to the company’s board in 2012 as purchasing director. www.harveyandbrockless.co.uk

Harvey & Brockless will retain the Cheese Cellar brand as a division of its business

l A report released by the Extra Costs Commission and led by disability charity Scope has found that 75% of disabled people and their families have walked away from a UK business due to poor service. The value of this ‘Walk Away Pound’ is estimated at £1.8bn per month across the country.

The businesses highlighted by a survey of 2,000 people included restaurants, supermarkets and transport companies. l Devon’s Darts Farm and Villa Farm Shop in West Yorkshire were among the winning retailers at this year’s FARMA awards but the overall Retail Champion gong went to Middlesex Pick Your Own operation Parkside Farm. The other winners were Cambridgeshire’s St Ives Farmers’ Market (Farmers’ Market of the Year), Doddington Restaurant & Café in Lincolnshire (Farm Restaurant of the Year) and two Nottinghamshire businesses: Maxeys Farm Shop (Newcomer of the Year) and The Welbeck Farm Shop (Farm Butcher of the Year). l The Northern Irish government has announced plans to set up an industry-led agri-food marketing body similar to Scotland Food and Drink. Enterprise, Trade & Investment Minister Arlene Foster said the new organisation was needed to sustain the growth of the country’s budding food industry. l Hampshire-based distributor Samways has introduced a “super minimum” order amount covering the majority of its product range for customers across the UK’s mainland. The £200 order amount for non-fragile items will be available to customers located throughout England, Wales and parts of Scotland. The amount for customers in the central south of England will remain at £180. l Sales of organic products in the UK have returned to 2009 levels thanks in part to a growth surge in independent retail sales and online shopping, according to the Soil Association. The organic accreditation body’s 2015 Organic Market Report stated that independents saw a 5.7% rise in sales in 2014 and now account for £286.5m or 15.4% of the total UK organic sales (£1.86bn).

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

5

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April 2015 路 Vol.16 Issue 3

fine food news Tory minister backs small producer growth at Defra Food Stars launch What is Food Stars?

Defra Secretary Elizabeth Truss met a host of small food and drink producers at the unveiling of the Government’s 50 Food Stars project

By MICHAEL LANE

Environment Secretary and Conservative MP Elizabeth Truss wants to get more of Britain’s small food and drink producers exporting and growing to become mediumsized companies.

Speaking to FFD at the launch of Defra’s Food Stars initiative at the end of February, Truss said that the Conservative party sees food and farming as a “critical economic sector” and would continue to promote it, if it won the next General Election. It is thought that

Truss, who is also seen as a rising star within her party, may reprise her current cabinet role if the Tories return to power in May. When asked if the Food Stars project – set up to aid the expansion of a select band of 50 small producers – might go against some companies’ artisan principles, Truss said that there was scope to help everybody.

“Some producers will always be small scale artisan producers.

That’s what they want to do,” she said. “There are others who

Held on February 26 at Defra’s offices in Westminster, the Food Stars launch event saw some 50 firms (the majority of whom are Great Taste winners) in attendance for a day of workshops and a lunchtime showcase of their products.

The chosen companies include Bath Soft Cheese Co (World Champion in the 2014 World Cheese Awards), Hebridean salmon smoker Uig Lodge and Scarlett & Mustard.

Northern Ireland’s Abernethy Butter, Welsh producer The Coconut Kitchen and gin distillery Warner Edwards were also on the list as well as Yorkshire chorizo maker Three Little Pigs and Patchwork Paté – both of which are sponsoring the Guild of Fine Food’s charcuterie promotional campaign for 2015-16.

All 50 businesses will receive a package of support from the Food & Drink Federation and Cranfield University over the next year.

Among those speaking to the businesses at February’s event were former Sainsbury’s CEO Justin King and Nestlé UK & Ireland CEO Dame Fiona Kendrick.

want to expand. I want to see [more] medium-sized enterprises as well and have more presence in overseas markets.

“One of the issues the UK has often had is not enough of our small and medium enterprises export and that’s a big difference between us and a country like Germany.”

Truss said that technology was making it easier for small businesses to find a market for their goods abroad, citing a meeting with Chinese online food retailers on her recent visit to the country in January.

If I'd known then what I know now...

venture to the back of the shop and ask for one. One of our first tasks was to remove the shelving from the back wall and blackboard the entire wall.

We do 22 different types of made-toMARK KACARY THE NORFOLK DELI, HUNSTANTON order sandwiches and our takeaway menu now accounts for a third of our revenue. types of olives on our counter at all My wife Rosie and I bought a going Installing a commercial kitchen times. concern, The Wine Cellar & Deli, in January allowed us to extend our Despite offering such choice, we in the Victorian seaside resort of takeaway menu beyond sandwiches don’t really have any waste. When Hunstanton. The business had been and add on some new services; our we have something that needs using going for six years before we took daughter is a trained baker so she is up – for example, ham that is carved it over in January 2014. It was very launching cakes for much wine first, deli second and We have learned some big lessons all occasions. We could easily have been mistaken for are also offering a an off licence. about taking over an existing We have travelled a fair amount business – work out what you think luxury picnic service for people staying and always loved visiting markets it will cost and then double it. in nearby holiday and delis in continental Europe cottages. off the bone – it gets made into where the counters are rammed full There’s very little we’ve tried that sandwiches, soup and quiches on of meats and cheeses and there are hasn’t worked. We’ve found that our takeaway menu. It has helped no antiseptic smells, just the smell of if it is local it will work – and it will massively that prior to opening our food. work even better if you can make it deli, Rosie was a food manager for We wanted to create our version yourself.

Dobbies, where she turned round one of one of these establishments. We We have learned some big lessons of their most unprofitable stores. are proud to offer the widest choice about taking over an existing business The previous shop did of cheeses within a 50-mile radius.

– work out what you think it will cost sandwiches, but only by stealth – if We have a minimum of five hams, six and then double it. Without a proven customers were brave enough to salamis, seven patés and 10 different

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She added that, if the Food Stars initiative proved successful, Defra would look at “future opportunities” to do something similar again.

“Today’s event is about is helping us sell more British food in Britain, understanding what the issues are with the supply chain,” Truss told FFD. “We’ve got some of the major supermarkets here. They’re looking at new entrepreneurs coming through so they can get those fantastic products on our shelves.”

track record it was hard to be tough in negotiations. Now we are having to replace all the equipment that came with the shop because it’s clapped out. It was difficult to ascertain that before buying it without paying for engineers to come and check it over.

We had to just go on trust that it had been serviced.

The existing EPOS system gave us an idea of what revenue to expect. We set a target for our first year that was 20% higher than had been achieved the previous year. We ended up doubling the previous year’s turnover to just over £250,000. This year, we’re already 20% up on that.

Because of the number of people who come in asking to sit down and eat in we’re considering opening a deli-café in or close to Hunstanton.

But we’ll only do this if the right opportunity arises. We’re keen to keep the shop looking like the deli we set out to create – an emporium dedicated to fantastic food from Norfolk and beyond.

Interview by LYNDA SEARBY

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

7

fine food news The ambient market’s flat – and right now the suppliers aren’t helping

Viewpoint

PAUL CASTLE Business manager, Farrington Farm Shop, Somerset There was a time when every farm shop had just one or two ‘hero’ products – usually fresh fruit, vegetables or meat – grown or reared on the farm. Everything else was bought in, including shelf-loads of ambient jams and chutneys.

But something has gone wrong in the ambient sector. I know of at least 15 farm shops, ours included, where ambient sales are flat at best. There’s a massive amount of discussion among us about cutting the space given to bought-in jars and other dry goods and, in many cases, replacing it with fresh foods made on site. Some people are saying they’d like to see 70-80% of sales coming from products made in-house, and with most good farm shops now having a big caférestaurant operation, it’s more and more feasible.

In a lot of ways, producers and distributors have only themselves to blame. There’s very little innovation

– they’re all making the same thing – and the bulk of what used to be regarded as ‘artisan’ brands have now gone into supermarkets.

They start out in the independents, but then think they’ve seen a pot of gold in the multiples and bang, they’re gone.

We also find the same products cropping up under private label in other shops or tourist outlets, with a label saying “Specially made for us by X”, so the whole market becomes even more diluted. After all, there are only so many jams and pickles anyone can sell.

We are struggling to get local producers to come up with anything new, aside from yet another jam or pickle. I can understand why this is: the amount of regulation around food nowadays means it’s easier to produce low-risk lines. That’s why so many people go into baked goods too – they’re safe. At every trade show, it’s just a raft of easy-to-make lines.

But what we need is more innovation in convenience foods and finished products. How many really good ready-meal or pie producers are there out there? Yes, you can buy frozen pies for bake-off, but top quality fresh pies like Chunk are thin on the ground.

Price is another big issue with ambient goods. There certainly hasn’t been much sign of the

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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❛ I think there’s a bit of have-your-cake-and-eat-it among suppliers, especially distributors ❜

Retailers urged to support blood cancer charity scheme A Cheshire farm shop is asking fellow retailers to join in a simple fundraising idea that could raise thousands for a leading blood cancer charity.

Under its Bones For Bones scheme, Cheerbrook Farm Shop’s butchery offers fresh bones for customers to take home for their dogs in return for a small donation to Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research (L&LR).

Shop owner Andrew Shufflebotham said Cheerbrook had been running Bones For Bones for a couple of years and it had been well supported by customers.

In the past 12 months the store has raised almost £600 for the South Cheshire branch of L&LR, and it’s now working with

‘deflation’ that is supposedly We have always said that if any happening in food, and with more offer comes to us, we will pass it on and more producers choosing to to the consumer. The idea of price work through distributors we are promotion is to lift sales long-term, into the world of minimum order even if they drop back a bit when quantities with all of them. the promotion is over. It is not just In fact, I think there’s a bit of about lining the distributor’s pocket. have-your-cake-andeat-it among suppliers, There’s massive discussion especially distributors.

A product has to be among farm shops about cutting really, really extrathe space given to ambient goods special for us to be and, in many cases, replacing it able to charge £3.95 with fresh foods made on site or £4 a jar, yet trade prices are creeping up, in many cases the jar sizes are If distributors are not playing the coming down, and what used to game, they need to take a long, give us a margin of 35-38% is now hard look at themselves. only giving 30%.

In the past three or four years, So, naturally, we are taking every good farm shop has added a some of that shelf space back for café or restaurant. Once you have our own lines – we make around chefs and have been running a 350 products in our kitchens kitchen for a year or two, going at Farrington Farm Shop – and into production is a lot less scary. squeezing out some of those And the rules around making bought-in brands, because we can’t products to sell in your own shop survive on 30%. And I have to ask are a lot less onerous than selling to suppliers: what did you expect? the trade.

The other day I tried a little We offer consultancy services to experiment. I bypassed some of other farm shops, and we’ve never our distributors, went straight to had so much interest from people the producers and asked what kind who want to learn about setting up of deals they could do me. I found their own production kitchens. If out the manufacturers were setting you can make more of what you sell up good price deals with their on your own premises and achieve distributor – but these weren’t being a much higher margin, then why passed on. That’s just wrong. wouldn’t you?

the charity to encourage other retailers to join the scheme.

Design agency Era Creative has contributed a logo design for a collection box that L&LR can supply, with other fundraising help, to any farm shops or butchers willing to take part.

The charity works to improve the lives of patients with all types of blood cancer, including leukaemia, lymphoma and myeloma.

For more information on taking part in the Bones For Bones scheme, email catriona@ beatingbloodcancers.org.uk or call 0191 208 2716.

HAVE YOUR SAY Tweet us: @ffdonline Email us: editorial@gff.co.uk

TOP OF THE SMALL SHOPS: North Yorkshire deli Hunters of Helmsley, owned and run by Christine and Chris Garnett, was named winner in the inaugural Best Small Shops Competition 2015.

Twenty shops were shortlisted for the scheme, which was established by the All Party Parliamentary Small Shops Group and is run on its behalf by the Independent Retailers Confederation.

They included two other delis – the Mainstreet Trading Co in Roxburghshire and Piccola Italia in Worthing, West Sussex – as well as general grocers, a book shop, music store and bike shops.

One of the UK’s most picturesque delis, Hunters of Helmsley was set up in 1990 and has been owned by the Garnetts – who both come from Yorkshire farming families – since 2008.

Hunters of Helmsley was chosen by the judges for its local sourcing of produce, organisation of events to support the high street and its use of social media to engage customers. Around 70% of the shop’s stock is sourced from Yorkshire. www.huntersofhelmsley.com

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Ciders

NEW

2015

Vol.16 Issue 3 路 April 2015

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We’ve now go ne STAN D S6 Farm 0 S hop D on

Deli Sh p ow 2 & 015

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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fine food news Analysis With all of the political parties ramping up their campaigns and finalising manifestos for the General Election, MICHAEL LANE looks at what they have to offer the speciality food sector and asks the industry what it wants from the next Parliament.

It’s party time: who should get the fine food vote?

CEO, Taste of the West

“There are lots marginal seats in the West Country and the parties are trying to curry favour so it’s a good time for lobbying,” says Sheaves, who heads one of the few food groups that are still operating in England.

If the next Government were looking to revive some regional groups, Sheaves says he would be happy to offer pointers on adopting a similar model to his organisation’s.

He would be reluctant, though, to see a return to decentralised regional bodies like the RDAs of the 2000s.

Sheaves’ primary interest is promoting the South West’s producers both at home and abroad.

He would like to see more money for small businesses looking to export their products. “UK Trade & Investment are very good but they don’t support sales in a practical sense,” he says. “That’s where small businesses need help.”

The party line so far:

Equally, Sheaves wants more help for those food businesses who rely on selling domestically, particularly to tourists.

As well as a cut in VAT for hospitality businesses, he says he would like to see the next ruling party deliver on “mutterings” about a tourism minister and bring England’s £7m tourism budget somewhere closer to Scotland’s current £60m spend.

❛

The intent is there and the pronouncements are fair but the Government don’t follow it up with the detail

❜

While he applauds the Government’s campaign to encourage consumers to Buy British and its support for provenance branded labels, Sheaves says it must go further.

“That’s all well and good but it won’t make much difference because the consumer still wants to know who made it and more about the production process to justify paying a premium.”

He adds: “The intent is there and

Conservatives

Following Defra Secretary of State Elizabeth Truss’s announcement of a long-term plan in February, the Conservatives have offered the most detail on food and farming of all the parties contesting the election.

Among the measures that have already been put in motion are Food Enterprise Zones, to aid the development of food businesses in specific geographical areas, and the 50 Food Stars initiative that has earmarked 50 small producers for business mentoring.

Truss said that she would also look to continue cutting red tape both nationally and at EU level as well as boosting the numbers of agri-food apprentices and developing educational courses for aspiring students.

Increasing export markets for UK food businesses will be prioritised as will more public sector procurement of British food.

If they return to Government, the Conservatives will also remain committed to tackling bovine TB. George Osborne’s final budget of this Parliament indicated that a second term for the Conservatives would mean more of the same – cutting the deficit but spurring economic growth.

There were a number of measures in there that would affect food businesses, chiefly a review of, and relief from, business rates. The minimum wage looks set to rise again but a number of cuts will be made to Corporation Tax and employers’ National Insurance contributions.

the pronouncements are fair but the Government don’t follow it up with the detail.”

William Chase

Founder, Chase Distillery

William Chase’s political perspective is informed by running businesses on both sides of the Channel.

Since making a success of – and subsequently selling – his Tyrrells Crisps business, Chase has moved into the drinks industry, founding the Chase Distillery in his native Herefordshire and buying a vineyard in Provence.

“I’ve run businesses in this country and a vineyard in France – dealing with a socialist government that stops free trade – and it’s clear that people don’t realise how lucky they are in this country, with a government that supports entrepreneurs,” he tells FFD. His views on Francois Hollande’s government are matched by his disdain for the previous New Labour governments.

“Take Terry Leahy and the Labour government,” says Chase.

“They awarded him an MBE because he did his best to reduce inflation by screwing farmers.”

While he believes “there’s nowhere better to set up as an independent retailer or

❛

I’ve run businesses in this country and in France, and it’s clear that people don’t realise how lucky they are in this country, with a government that supports entrepreneurs

❜

The party line so far:

Lib Dems Given the current coalition, it can sometimes be hard to tell which policies come from the Lib Dems, particularly economic ones. Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander launched the Government’s “radical review” of national business rates just before the budget, as well as a new packaged of rates relief.

The party has also taken credit for a number of other small-business-friendly policies launched in the 2015 Budget, including the continued fuel price freeze and rural broadband expansion.

It does not want to leave the EU or to hold a referendum on the subject but has said it wants to improve EU efficiency.

The majority of its electioneering policies so far have been focussed on education and tougher environmental laws.

While its backing for economic growth and small businesses is clear, there seems to be little detail on food and farming at the moment.

However, it has laid claim to the recently announced measure to allow farmers to average their income over five years for tax purposes. producer” than in the UK, Chase would like to see the next Government go even further in aiding small business growth.

As well as tax breaks and National Insurance relief for smaller companies, he says there needs to be less red tape, particularly regarding food hygiene requirements for very small producers.

Chase is still lamenting the demise of Food From Britain after government funding was pulled in 2009 and would like to see more support for exporting producers. ▼

John Sheaves

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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fine food news “At shows, you see Spain, France and Italy with a hangarfull of their own suppliers and a GB stand with four or five producers on it,” he says.

Chase is similarly passionate about the reinstatement of funding for regional food groups, which have all but disappeared in the wake of cuts, to provide support for new start-ups.

Paul Hargreaves

Founder, Cotswold Fayre

Given Cotswold Fayre’s broad customer base, spanning the rural farm shop and the inner city deli, Paul Hargreaves says his business serves people across the political spectrum.

While he may not be ready to nail his colours to the mast, Hargreaves has had enough of the “ridiculous” focus on courting would-be homebuyers.

“My main beef is – and I can’t see any party is going to do this – there’s not an awful lot to encourage

❛

If they make trade agreements so business can go on as if we were in the EU, I don’t have a problem leaving. I’m not going to vote UKIP, though!

❜

The party line so far:

The party line so far:

Greens

The Greens are arguably the most radical of the upand-coming political parties.

The party’s economic policy of zero or negative growth would see less consumer spending and a focus on smaller, localised food production and a reduction of ‘food miles’ and imports, which would be limited with new taxes.

The Green Party would abolish VAT and National Insurance in favour of new taxes while it would alter business rates and Corporation Tax to favour smaller entrepreneurship,” he says. “It’s a lot more simple in places like the States.

You have to be an extreme risk-taker in this country.”

He would like to see the tax breaks afforded to larger firms given to smaller companies, particularly when it comes to taxes on employment. Further reductions and relief of National Insurance and being able to claim Statutory Sick Pay would be welcome but Hargreaves is not concerned by rising wages.

“All businesses complain about the minimum wage,” he says. “I actually want it raised because I think companies should be paying a living wage.”

Unlike others in the industry, Hargreaves is not overly worried about the possibility of leaving the European Union, provided it is handled correctly.

“If they make trade agreements like Israel so business can go on as if we were in the EU, I don’t have a problem with that,” he says. “I’m not going to vote UKIP, though!”

“I’ve just come back from Greece and the place is a complete mess,” he adds. “Prior to that I was always in favour of going into the Euro currency.”

Hargreaves is another who says

Labour

“Labour recognises the important role that small food producers, independent high street delicatessens, farm shops and premium food halls play in our economy, creating jobs and providing a greater variety of food and high-quality produce. Labour has a better plan to support and promote the growth of these small businesses” That’s what a Labour spokesperson told FFD, adding that the election is a choice between a Conservative plan that has failed small business or a Labour’s plan for a “broad-based recovery which avoids a race to the bottom”.

The party is pledging to reduce the financial burden facing SMEs. Measures include freezing energy bills until 2017, which it says will save 2.4m businesses £1.5bn in costs. It will also cut business rates on properties with an annual rental value of less than £50,000 in 2015 and freeze them the following year.

It wants to create more careers in food as well as secure investment for SMEs via a new British Investment Bank and regional business banks.

Labour plans to strengthen the Food Standards Agency and increase consumer protection to prevent a reoccurrence of the Horsemeat scandal.

Labour’s food strategy will support the UK’s food, farming and fisheries sector by remaining in the EU and looking to improve country-of-origin labelling.

Its plan for Brtiain’s high streets revolves around working with businesses, landlords and local communities to determine what is actually needed and establish the right balance of commercial and domestic properties.

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April 2014 · Vol.16 Issue 3

businesses. It would seek to increase production of organic products and promote healthier food including funding research on reducing the amount of meat in people’s diets.

Decentralising government at all levels is a key policy and this would include holding a referendum on EU membership or, at very least, lobbying to localise some powers currently held by Europe.

It would also look to reduce free trade with the USA.

the sector misses the now defunct Food From Britain, which helped smaller producers grow abroad.

“I don’t think political parties are interested in the food industry at all,” he says. “There are a lot of resources put into export but not in terms of food and drink.

“Technology is the only thing they seem to put money into.”

Maria Whitehead

Director, Hawkshead Relish

As a rule, Maria Whitehead prefers to keep her own voting preference personal but she will be scrutinising what each party has to offer her business.

“There is a great deal of rhetoric and not always a lot of action,” she tells FFD. That said, Whitehead was pleased with the most recent budget and the continued focus on economic growth.

“It’s clear that the economy is on a much sounder footing, as a result of the austerity measures, than it was five years ago and I would want the next Government to continue this trend and not to reverse the process,” she says. “So, on the whole, I know I would not be in favour of a Labour Government returning to power as I can’t see anything in their fiscal policies which encourages me as a business person to have faith and trust in their plan for the longevity of growth.”

It’s clear that the ❛economy is on a much sounder footing, as a result of the austerity measures, than it was five years ago and I would want the next Government to continue this.

❜

Whitehead was keen to praise her “very effective and helpful” current MP, the Lib Dem Tim Farron, but she is still waiting for more policies to emerge from all parties before deciding where her cross will land on polling day.

Jenny Whitham

MD, Patchwork Paté

The Patchwork Paté director was pleased to be chosen for Defra’s recently launched 50 Food Stars initiative to help promising producers and hopes it is a sign

❛

It’s a great start by this Government to show how committed they are to the food and drink sector but just a pity it was done only two months before the election.

❜

of things to come for the next Parliament.

“It’s a great start by this Government to show how committed they are to the food and drink sector but just a pity it was done only two months before the election,” she tells FFD, adding that it reinforces the message that the current Government values the food and drink industry as an important contributor to the economy.

The SMEs and the microbusinesses that are the cornerstone of speciality food and drink, she says, tend to fare better under Conservative governments.

“Having said that the Conservatives have many other trains of thought that I struggle with,” she says. “And, in reality, I think every party has its good bits and its not-so-good bits. Some even have positively bad bits but whoever gets in we’ll have to live with them for a while.”

The party line so far:

UKIP While it may have evolved into more than a one-issue party, UKIP is still committed to withdrawing the UK from the European Union. It has pledged to negotiate a bespoke trade agreement with the EU to allow businesses, including exporters, to continue as before.

On the high street it will encourage councils to increase more free parking and it will simplify planning regulations on commercial property that has been vacant for more than a year.

When hiring, employers will be given the right to discriminate in favour of young British workers.

UKIP wants to protect the Green Belt and will take measures to encourage the development of brownfield sites for both commercial and housing development. It will also introduce a planning system that gives local residents the opportunity to veto planning permission for large developments.

Under a UKIP government, all food would have to be labelled to include the country of origin, method of production, method of slaughter, hormones and any genetic additives.

Instead of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy, UKIP would introduce a single payment policy for farmers and it would also ban the export of live animals for slaughter.

Mary Quicke MD, Quickes Traditional

“Our business relies on sensible, science based policies in farming and cheese-making, so we want a party that will keep us in Europe,” says Mary Quicke, adding that the next party in Government must support exports if Quickes is to continue selling its cheddar and other cheeses abroad.

❛

Bovine TB is a big worry for cheesemakers, so we need a party willing to deal with badgers in an effective way

❜

Her other major concern is the effect of Bovine TB on dairy herds.

“It’s a big worry for cheesemakers, so we need a party willing to deal with the problem of sick badgers in an effective way,” she says.

She would also welcome business-friendly policies like tax relief on investments and funding for scientific research.

Michael Dale

Umami Delicatessen

As you might expect from a high street retailer, business rates are Dale’s biggest bugbear. Whoever forms the next Government, the review of the rates system – proposed before the recent budget announcement – must go ahead, he says.

While he currently receives £1,500 of relief on his annual bill of £9,600, he would like to see a permanent reduction and a fairer method of calculating them, citing the small amounts online retailers pay. “£1,500 off is great but it’s not always going to be there,” he tells FFD. “Change the whole way these rates are calculated. That will give me more confidence that politicians are supporting us.”

Employer National Insurance contributions also need looking at, says Dale, who would like to see a permanent minimum earnings threshold introduced in place of the temporary relief available to employers.

When it comes to the longrunning debate about out-of-town development and halting the

The party line so far:

The party line so far:

Plaid Cymru

“The Party of Wales” wants to encourage the sales growth of its “world class” food, both domestically and internationally. Plaid Cymru’s aim is to increase the amount of Welsh produce processed within the country and, thus, add value to its economy. It has also pledged to increase the amount of Welsh food and drink procured by its own schools and hospitals.

It is committed to reviving the country’s high streets by improving urban planning to foster healthier lifestyles and by exempting more small companies from business rates or at least providing rate relief.

Its proposals also include the creation of a Bank of Wales to invest in indigenous businesses and a drive to attract outside investment. decline of Britain’s High Streets, Dale is not entirely sure that the Government is getting it right.

“What’s needed, and I'm not even sure this needs government input, is just trying to find out what's actually happening on the high street,” he says. “We’ve all got theories about it. People are moving away from big supermarkets and going to Aldi and Lidl and shops like mine.”

❛

Change the whole way business rates are calculated.

That will give me more confidence that politicians are supporting us.

❜

Dale believes that the traditional high street is an “anachronism” and planners need to alter the way they look at developments.

“If the high street is genuinely changing and people are changing the way they shop, going to smaller out-of-town shops, then what should planners be doing about zoning?” he says.

“It’s inefficient for the government to intervene and trying to protect something that people don’t actually want.”

Whoever gets it, Dale says they have to keep the economy growing and consumers spending confidently.

“That’s going to benefit my shop and the high street generally.”

SNP

Given its estimated value to Scotland’s economy – £2.5m per day – the SNP has a strong policy focus on food and drink. The devolved SNP Scottish Government, rather than Westminster, handles the majority of its promotional activities, which includes a detailed export plan targeting billions of pounds of growth. The SNP says it will continue to work with the UK Government to remove barriers and reduce tariffs for its exports.

The party also plans to launch a Scottish dairy brand to promote products at home and abroad.

Responsibility for the high street also falls to the SNP Government. Its Community Empowerment Bill features plans to allow local authorities to introduce their own localised business rates and relief schemes as well as bring empty properties back into use through up to 50% rate relief.

The SNP is not satisfied with the UK Government negotiating on its behalf with the EU about agricultural policy and will strive to get Scottish ministers at EU level to ensure the cutting of red tape that specifically affects Scotland’s farmers.

John Farrand

MD, The Guild of Fine Food

“The Guild of Fine Food has no political allegiance but it does have a political agenda,” says MD John Farrand, adding that the trade association has been lobbying the Government on behalf of independents as a member of the Independent Retailers Confederation (IRC).

While it is hard to gauge the effect of speaking to politicians, Farrand says, they do have the ability to get businesses noticed.

“Instead of nailing our red, blue or yellow flag to a mast we need to make hay this year to ensure that independent retail gets noticed. The election for me is not an opportunity to vote for David, Ed, Nick or Nigel but an opportunity to grab some Westminster attention while they want us for their own PR means.”

Farrand cites recent events like the Best Small Shops Competition, organised by the IRC and promoted by MPs, and Defra’s 50 Food Stars as signs of Westminster waking up to the importance of fine food. “Not since the days of Food From Britain have we been shown so much love and muchneeded investment,” he says. “So don’t just focus on who gets into Number 10 on May 7.

“When you next get doorstepped by fawning politicians, remind them that you don’t just make or sell great tasting food but you represent a part of the food trade that is increasingly loved by consumers but ignored by central government.”

❛

The election for me is not an opportunity to vote for David, Ed, Nick or Nigel but an opportunity to grab some Westminster attention

❜

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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A promotional feature on behalf of RH Amar Top left: Founder Raoul Amar, bottom left: RH Amar’s first office in Holborn Viaduct, this photo: the current Family Board

RH Amar owned brands

RH Amar celebrates 70 years When Raoul Amar borrowed £2,000 in 1945 to start a food import business, it would have seemed a remote and unrealistic ambition to become the UK’s first choice fine food supplier. Yet 70 years later this family-owned business, now well into its third generation, distributes over 40 fine food brands, sourced in the UK and from six continents and 25 countries around the world.

T

he company began its life in somewhat Dickensian offices at No.6 Holborn Viaduct in the City of London. Britain, in those early post-war years, faced serious food shortages and “fine food”, as we know it, scarcely existed. Raoul Amar, who had come to this country from France in the 1930s, made regular trips across the Channel to source the best French food he could find to sell on the British market, gradually extending his sourcing to other countries.

Business flourished in those early years, but in the 1950s, when food rationing ended and competition intensified, RH Amar faced a real struggle to survive. It then became apparent that the route to survival lay in a determined focus on quality, and to this day this commitment to quality still underpins RH Amar’s portfolio of brands.

Raoul’s son, Henry, joined the business in 1960 and continued the process of securing distributorships for quality food brands, which firmly established the company’s credentials in the world of fine foods. In 1972, RH Amar left London for a new base in Amersham, and in 1996 moved to its present site in High Wycombe.

Henry’s elder son, Rob, the

current Managing Director, joined the business in 2001, and he was joined in 2013 by his younger brother, James.

RH Amar’s brand and product portfolio is extensive, making the company a dominant player in categories like olives, pickles, antipasti, oils, dressings, sauces, ethnic foods, baked goods and speciality canned fruits, vegetables and tomatoes, as well as newer categories like baby food and gluten-free. Many of these successes are founded on long-standing relationships with suppliers and brand owners, some of which go back 10, 20 years – or in the case of Crespo olives – 60 years!

An important ingredient in the company’s recent growth has been the creation of house brands.

Of these the largest is Cooks&Co, which now includes more than 100 fine food products and storecupboard ingredients aimed at aspiring cooks and professional chefs.

RH Amar’s growth has been almost entirely organic, but in 2014 the company acquired the Mary Berry’s brand of dressings, sauces and chutneys. Mary Berry has written over 70 cookery books, and is a widely acclaimed and popular

TV personality, yet she still finds time to work with RH Amar developing new products – the latest being luxury mayonnaises. With redesigned labelling and an enhanced consumer marketing plan, like Cooks&Co, this is set to be a major part of RH Amar’s portfolio.

These house brands, in common with the many other ranges distributed by RH Amar, are stocked by nearly every specialist wholesaler in the country, ensuring that independent retailers, delicatessens, farm shops and garden centres throughout the UK can access these fantastic products.

In 2015, RH Amar celebrates its 70th anniversary, and has achieved a lot. It now has a committed team of 65 people, and 90,000 sq ft of warehousing which is home to more than 1,000 products. The company was a founder member of the Guild of Fine Food, is BRC-accredited, and holds Investors in People and Best Companies accreditation. It also devotes 10% of net profits to local and national charities. All this, combined with a wealth of experience and the support of family ownership, means that RH Amar enters its eighth decade with a high degree of optimism and confidence in the fine food sector.

• Cooks&Co • Mary Berry’s • The Original Waffle Company

Brands distributed exclusively by RH Amar • Bornier Mustards • Budweiser BBQ Sauces • Buiteman Savoury Biscuits • Busch Meringues • Camp Chicory & Coffee Essence • Carbonell Olive Oil and Vinegar • Cardini Salad Dressings • Certo Liquid Apple Pectin • Crespo Olives, Capers and Tapenades • Drogheria & Alimentaria Infused Oils and Spice Grinders • D’aucy Continental Canned Vegetables • Del Monte Canned Fruits • Ella’s Kitchen Organic Baby Foods • Gaea Olives, Olive Oil and Tapenades • Geeta’s Indian Chutneys, Sauces and Pastes • Kikkoman Soy Sauce • Kuhne Pickles and Relishes • Meica Sausages • Monini Olive Oil • Mutti Tomato Products • Nando’s Peri-Peri Sauces • Palirria Greek Meze • Prewett’s Gluten-Free Biscuits • Provena Gluten-Free Cereals & Baking Ingredients • Queen Cake Decorations • Sacla’ Pestos, Sauces and Antipasti • Taylor & Colledge Vanilla Products • Wing Yip Chinese Foods

Turnpike Way, High Wycombe, Bucks HP12 3TF Tel: 01494 530 200, Fax: 01494 472076 info@rhamar.com, www.rhamar.com Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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A promotional feature on behalf of Hider Foods

Perfect! For when you have Folk In.

Exclusive distribution for your brand?

To be or not to be? That is the question….

A

s Managing Director of Hider Foods, I have been dealing with suppliers of all sizes for 19 years and the biggest decision small producers have to make as they outgrow their own distribution capabilities is who to work with and the type of arrangement that suits them best. It would appear to be a simple matter but, in reality, it’s not.

The first route is to enter an exclusive contract with one distributor. The advantages for the distributor are obvious but there can also be definite benefits for the producer in this type of relationship. It gives over control of the pricing and market positioning of the brand entirely to the producer and their chosen wholesale partner, who will naturally be more invested in the product’s success as the sole supplier. The comforting influence of an industry expert and a paternal arm around the shoulders should also not be underestimated.

The second approach would be to supply a number of distributors and, ultimately, this seems to be the way most producers go. Using more than one distributor will increase the numbers of retailers exposed to the product and enhance the profile of the brand by consequence. The lack of a monopoly means that retailers will source the product at the best price available. They can make more margin or pass the savings on to the end consumer but either way this will make the retailers more kindly disposed to that particular brand.

At Hider Foods, our 50 years of experience teach us to take a relaxed approach. If we enter into an exclusive arrangement it is normally sealed by a handshake rather than a watertight legal document. It makes no sense for either party to be locked into an arrangement if the sales volumes are insufficient.

We’re equally comfortable with producers that want more than one wholesaler. It is a more honest approach because if a brand is carried by a number of distributors the playing field is levelled and the product ends up being sold at a fair and realistic price. Then it is down to whichever distributor does the best job as to which takes the bulk of the sales. Give the customer the choice and they will vote accordingly.

Every situation is unique and the most important piece of advice that I would give to producers is to choose the option that makes you most comfortable and prioritises the long-term development of your brand.

Don’t be bullied by a distributor (like me!) into entering into an exclusive arrangement unless it is absolutely the right thing for your brand, because when it comes to business, there is nothing noble about suffering the slings and arrows of fortune, outrageous or otherwise.

Folkington’s Juices, The Workshop, Endlewick House, Arlington, East Sussex BN26 6RU 01323 485602 - info@folkingtons.com

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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beans, selected for their quality and prepared to order in the UK. Sticking with the Pleasant and Green ethos of excellent customer service and attention to detail.

cheesewire

news & views from the cheese counter

Hill Farm trials whey starters to boost flavour

Unsung heroes Hidden gems from British producers

www.pongcheese.co.uk

By PATRICK McGUIGAN

CHELLINGTON In a nutshell: Bedfordshire farm Wodehill rears traditional breeds of sheep, cattle and goats, using the milk to make cheeses such as Wodehill Blue and Childwickbury.

Last year, it launched an intriguing mixed milk cheese called Chellington after Oliver Hudson took inspiration from cheeses he saw being made in Sicily. Made with Jersey milk and goats’ milk, the soft mould-ripened pasteurised cheese is matured for three weeks and comes in 160g rounds.

Flavour and texture: The rich, buttery flavour of Jersey milk contrasts with the slight sharpness from the goats’ milk with fruity, vegetal and herbaceous notes.

The cheese has a silky texture and becomes gooey as it ripens.

History: Hudson started making cheese commercially in 2012 after working with cheese-makers in northern England, Scotland, southern France and Switzerland.

The farm uses a grass-based, high welfare approach to produce its own milk and meat. It produces around 1,000 Chellingtons a week.

Somerset-based Hill Farm Dairy is trialling the use of whey starters in its raw milk Stawley goats’ cheese – a practice that is common on the Continent but rarely seen in the UK. Co-owner Will Atkinson said the method, which involves inoculating milk with whey from the previous batch, gives the cheese a “less acidic and more rounded, layered flavour”.

However, virtually all cheese-makers in the UK use either frozen direct vat inoculation (DVI) or liquid ‘bulk’ starters because they are considered to be safer.

“Using your own starter like this is the holy grail of cheesemaking,” said Atkinson. “It means the cultures you are using are very distinct to you. It’s the best way to express the flavours in your unpasteurised milk. It’s also a nice feeling that everything in the cheese is home-grown.”

He added: “Whey starters are very rare over here. 80% of lactic cheese-makers in France use them, though. It’s considered risky, in that, if there’s a problem in the milk, you’re in-breeding.

“It’s an area where we might be able to maximise the benefits

Will and Caroline Atkinson are now adding whey from previous batches to produce a new version of of their goats’ milk Stawley

of producing our own milk, as long as we get it right. If we can produce really good quality milk, the whey starters shouldn’t present a problem.”

Set up by Caroline and Will Atkinson in 2008, Hill Farm Dairy has a herd of around 100 goats and produces the soft wrinkly rinded Stawley mainly for Neal’s Yard Dairy.

Initial trials using the whey starter at the end of last year showed promising results, with staff at Neal’s Yard able to pick out the batches in blind taste tests. The

Wildes moves into bigger space

Why stock it: Mixed milk cheeses are a rarity in the UK, especially ones made with Jersey milk. Bedfordshire cheese-makers are even more rare.

Where to buy: From wholesalers including Cheese Wine, Cheese Store Direct and Abbey Cheese. www.wodehill.co.uk FFD features a different ‘unsung hero’ from Specialist Cheesemakers’ Association members each month. To get involved, contact: patrick.mcguigan@gff.co.uk

www.hillfarmdairy.co.uk

Buchanans uses British grape pomace in latest creation

Cheese care: Store with other soft cheeses, such as bries and Camemberts. Shelf life is around three weeks.

Perfect partners: Chefs like to bake and deep fry Chellington as they would a Camembert. Hudson recommends a full-bodied red or strong, dry cider to drink.

company now plans to build up the number of batches it makes with whey over the coming year.

Goats’ cheese-maker Mary Holbrook at Sleight Farm in Somerset has also been known to use whey starters in Tymsboro, while Bill Oglethorpe of London-based Kappacasein makes his own starters by incubating milk (originally from the farm that supplies him) in UHT milk at two different temperatures to nurture either mesophilic or thermophilic bacteria.

By PATRICK McGUIGAN

London cheesemonger Buchanans has developed a new cheese matured in grape pomace for Mayfair restaurant The Square.

The cows’ milk cheese, which is named Porchester after the street on which Buchanans is located, starts out life as a very young Morn Dew cheese from Somerset producer White Lake Cheese before being buried for eight to 12 weeks in grape pomace (leftover grape skin and pulp) from Hampshire vineyard Hambledon.

The final cheese has an intense, sweet and almost fermented flavour with a springy texture, said owner Rhuaridh Buchanan, who developed the cheese for the two-Michelinstarred restaurant, co-owned by chef Phil Howard.

“It was a bit of an experiment, but we’ve been really pleased with the results,” he said. “The Square has taken everything we’ve produced, but we are planning on making larger volumes later in the year so we can supply other customers.”

Urban cheese-maker Wildes has moved to substantially larger premises in Tottenham as it gears up to supply more independent retailers.

The company, which was set up by Philip Wilton in 2012, sells its products at markets including Borough and Alexandra Palace, but also supplies a handful or delis and restaurants in the Capital – a market it now hopes to grow.

The new premises on Queen Street, which are around five times the size of the previous unit, have much larger cheese maturing fridges and a bigger production space.

The company plans to develop more limited edition cheeses and run cheese-making workshops.

www.buchananscheesemonger.com

www.wildescheese.co.uk

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

cheesewire

Dairy dedication

Interview

PATRICK McGUIGAN pays a visit to Alison and Kevin Blunt’s Sussex farm to witness the 24/7 work that goes into making the multi-award-winning goats’ cheese Golden Cross

G

olden Cross had a good awards season last year, with its eponymous goats’ cheese winning a Super Gold at the World Cheese Awards and named best soft white at the British Cheese Awards. Not that owners Alison and Kevin Blunt were there to receive them. The couple are so busy making the St Maure-style cheese that they find it difficult to leave their farm near Lewes in East Sussex for any great length of time.

Apart from walking to the farm gate to collect the post, Alison calculates that she hasn’t been “off base” for the best part of a fortnight when I visit in early March.

Meanwhile, Kevin recounts how he had to miss one of their three sons playing at Lords in the final of a national village cricket competition because he had to be at the farm milking the goats.

“Our life is ruled by the cheese,” he says cheerfully as we take a tour of the dairy. “We’d like to get out more but the goats always need milking.”

The farm has a 230-strong herd, which is milked all year round, and although Golden Cross is technically made on alternate days, in reality the hand-ladled raw milk cheese needs tending every day. In addition, the company produces another goats’ cheese called Chabis and a mould-ripened sheep’s cheese called Flower Marie, which require similar levels of care and attention.

“It’s a 24/7 life,” says Alison. “If we’re not curdling or ladling we’re salting and turning the cheese from the previous day. It’s a bit like Blue Peter: ‘Here’s some I made earlier’.”

The Blunts produce 1,400 logs of Golden Cross every week, using the milk The hands-on approach is a from their herd of 230 goats, as well as 500 sheep’s milk Flower Maries world away from some of the big goats’ cheese factories where curd maker (Frenchman Regis Du Satre), The Blunts first met at university is extruded into long sausages and who was selling up. and, after living in various parts sliced into perfect logs, she explains, British goats’ cheese was in its of the country (Alison worked as as she wraps speckled white batons infancy back then and they soon a nurse and Kevin as a farmer), of Golden Cross ready for despatch attracted the interest of James eventually scraped together enough (a time consuming job in itself).

Aldridge – the legendary cheese money to buy the six-acre Sussex Despite all the retailer and affineur who was hard work (or perhaps instrumental in resurrecting British Our life is ruled by the cheese. because of it), it’s clear farmhouse cheese.

We’d like to get out more but the that the couple have “He just rolled up at the farm goats always need milking. a great love for what in his car one day,” says Kevin. they do and enjoy “We weren’t expecting him and we Kevin Blunt working together. Their were really nervous. We’d been to dedication certainly pays off when it the initial meeting of the Specialist farm in the mid Eighties. Initially comes to the cheese. Golden Cross Cheesemakers Association and he they lived in a caravan and raised is a modern classic. Zingy and fresh and Randolph Hodgson had seemed pigs, chickens and a few goats, with a velvety texture when young, like really influential people. James selling eggs and milk to local shops, it becomes denser, creamier and started stocking us in his shop in but moved into cheese-making more intense as it matures with a Beckenham and pushing us for in 1989 when they bought the gooey breakdown just under the wholesale. That’s when the business Golden Cross recipe and some basic white fluffy rind. really took off.” It wasn’t long equipment from a local cheese-

❛

❜

before Aldridge was also passing on a sheep’s cheese recipe he had developed, which went on to become Flower Marie.

The company has grown since then, but not massively. Kevin and Alison still do all the farming and cheese-making with the help of their 23-year-old son Matt and three part-time staff. They produce around 1,400 Golden Cross logs a week, plus 500 squares of Flower Marie, all of which are immediately snapped up by wholesalers such as Harvey & Brockless, Premier and Paxton & Whitfield. Independent retailers are a core market but Golden Cross is also popular with chefs who like the fact it is easy to slice and works just as well in a salad or grilled on sourdough as it does on a cheeseboard.

Production has been at capacity for several years with customers often unable to source as much as they would like. During my visit, the company is only sending out half orders because the goats are simply not producing enough milk.

“We try to be fair to everyone,” says Kevin. “People generally understand that we can only work with what the goats give us.

Generally it works okay but it does get fraught at Christmas.”

The obvious answer would be to get more goats, but that would mean expanding the milking parlour, and the dairy and storage rooms, which are cornered by a stream with no more space to build.

More importantly, the Blunts don’t want to change an award-winning formula.

“If we expanded big we could end up like a French goats’ cheese factory,” says Kevin. “We would have to change the way we make the cheese and that would change the final product. We like it the way it is.” www.goldencrosscheese.co.uk

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

33 19

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making more of british & continental charcuterie

The butcher and The Pig

Interview

A long-running partnership between a Hampshire butcher and the chef behind The Pig boutique hotels is set to yield its first high-end retail lines. MICK WHITWORTH reports.

D

iversifying into air-dried hams, chorizo and other cured lines has proved a tonic for thirdgeneration Hampshire butcher Alan Bartlett. Talking to FFD in his shop in New Milton, where the urban sprawl of Bournemouth and Christchurch meets the New Forest, he says: “I’ve been here since I could first stand up without falling over my apron, and finding something new has renewed my passion for the trade.”

That “something new” is A Pinch of Salt, a tiny charcuterie operation that Bartlett runs, in collaboration with chef James Golding, from the same high street butcher’s where he learned the trade from his father.

In fact, a Pinch of Salt is not that new. It was born nearly a decade ago when Bartlett began supplying meat and poultry to Golding’s kitchens.

And in a sense it goes back even further, since Golding’s parents bought their meat from Bartlett’s dad.

Born in Hampshire, Golding trained at The Savoy and worked at Le Caprice, J Sheekey and New York’s Soho House before heading home with his young family in 2006, initially as head chef at Harbour Heights, in Poole’s exclusive Sandbanks area.

With an Italian grandmother, a boyhood spent foraging in the New Forest and a grounding in classical French cookery, it’s little wonder he was drawn to Continental-style meats. Bartlett recalls: “James said to me one day, ‘We’ve got such good produce in this country, we should do more with it.’ So he started messing around with recipes, I produced whatever cuts of meat he required – and it springboarded from there.”

As the chef moved on to the Limewood group’s Whitley Ridge hotel in Brockenhurst, then helped turn it into The Pig – the first of four much-praised restaurants-withrooms now operating under that banner – he and Bartlett continued to collaborate. A Pinch of Salt now supplies all The Pig’s sites as well as other eateries, including Mark Hix restaurants in London and Dorset.

Golding doesn’t just lend his name to the venture. He and Bartlett are the production team too, making charcuterie in the shop on Sundays after a thorough clean-down.

James started ❛messing around with

recipes, I produced whatever cuts of meat he required – and it springboarded from there

❜

Alan Bartlett

Cured legs are air-dried for at least 12 months to produce what Bartlett (pictured) and Golding call ‘Karma ham’

A Pinch of Salt uses either free-range Middle White pigs from Hampshire, or Gloucester Old Spots from The Pig group itself, which rears the animals at two of its hotels. For a few months each winter Bartlett can also buy pannage pork, grazed in the woods, from Barry Topp of New Forest Cider in Burley. When the autumn acorn crop is poor, Topp supplements the pigs’ diets with

Branding for the new retail range is ready to roll once shelf-life testing is complete

apple pomace – the pulp left over after cider pressing. “Because these boys are producing small quantities they look after their pigs with total commitment,” says Bartlett.

Latterly, he has also been buying wild boar from Jamie Burgess of Swallowfields Farm in Bramshaw, who has begun rearing them in forest enclosures, centuries after their forebears were hunted to extinction.

It means A Pinch of Salt can offer its range made from different meats sourced from a variety of producers, giving chefs a better back-story to cite on their menus.

It’s a more or less ‘nose to tail’ stuff too. Legs are air-dried for at least 12 months to produce what Bartlett and Golding have dubbed “Karma ham”. Loin is boned out for lomo; shoulder is cured with salt, fennel and cinnamon to make coppa; the belly is used for pancetta. Spare muscle and trimmings go into chorizo and red wine salami.

When Bartlett takes me to see his hams air-drying in a “secret location” near the shop, there is barely room for him to

squeeze into the tiny space. But he is about to install a larger drying room that will double capacity and, with investment in a slicer, let him target new outlets. “With The Pig and other bits and pieces we’re almost at capacity. That’s why the new drying room is going in, and it will enable us to go into retailing too. We’ve got the packaging sorted. The next hurdle is to do some testing on sliced products – they have to have sensible use-by dates.”

When I ask if he is concerned that some of the UK’s biggest meat businesses are moving into charcuterie on a large scale, he seems unfazed. “You can’t stand in the way of the free market, so you have to constantly compete and find an edge.

“What we produce is all natural – it’s salt, sugar, spices and then time.

Invariably the big boys are going to be using more nitrates and nitrites.

And I can’t see they will be able to give the same reassurance about provenance as us. It’s down to a price, not up to a quality.” @apinchofsalt46 www.apinchofsaltcuring.co.uk

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

23

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

product focus

ice cream

Frozen fancies LYNDA SEARBY delves into the ice box to discover the latest innovations in ice cream, sorbets and frozen yoghurts.

Taywell Ice Creams has relaunched its processed-sugarfree ice creams as Sweet Rebellion, a new label that stands for natural, healthy, lactose-free, gluten-free, calorie-reduced ice cream. The Sweet Rebelllion range, which went on sale this month in independents throughout London, the South East and the Midlands with an RRP of £5.25 for a 500ml tube, takes in chocolate, strawberry, vanilla, chocolate hazelnut and pistachio flavours as well as a dairy-free raspberries & cream variety.

l Thaymar has added Bakewell tart, lemon curd, salted caramel, peanut butter and chocolate ripple to its menu of ice cream flavours available exclusively to the independent trade. www.thaymaricecream.co.uk

l In the last couple of

www.taywell.co.uk

American strawberry cheesecake, frozen yoghurt with mango, energy (Red Bull), banana & peanut butter, blackcurrant & liquorice and toffee mallow are the six new ice cream flavours available in 4.75-litre napoli containers from Morelli’s (trade price £11.50-21.00). The Irish producer has also added mango and plain Greek yoghurt to its frozen yoghurt line-up, and reformulated its Senza vanilla ice cream with the natural sweetener stevia. www.morellisices.com

Unlike dairy-free ice creams that use distinctively flavoured nut or coconut milks, Jude’s new dairy-free chocolate ice cream (RRP £4.69, 500ml tub) gets its creamy taste and texture from the raw cocoa butter made from cold-pressed beans. Jude’s says this has resulted in an ice cream that tastes “truly chocolately” and is suitable for those with nut allergies. The other development to come out of Jude’s kitchen is a new flavour, truly chocolate (RRP £5.99, 500ml), made with 100% cocoa solids from single estate Colombian beans. www.judes.co.uk

Foodservice refrigeration firm Adande has teamed up with ice cream equipment manufacturer Carpigiani to offer gelato workstations for delis and ice cream parlours. Intended as a complete solution for the preparation, production, storage and plating of gelato products, the castor-mounted units have a compact footprint of just 1100x700mm and operate on a 13 Amp power supply with no plumbing or water supply required. www.adande.com

www.nfic.co.uk

l West Sussexbased Caroline’s Dairy has named sea buckthorn, rhubarb, Banoffee and stem ginger, lime & chilli as its seasonal flavours for summer 2015. www.carolinesdairy.co.uk

l Bensons Totally Fruity has increased the fruit juice content of its Chilly Billy iced lollies and created a brand mascot, Billy the Penguin, for marketing and social media leverage. www.bensonstotallyfruity.co.uk

l Suffolk’s Alder Tree is now

According to cone and ingredient supplier Antonelli, people are becoming more discerning and want a fresh and crispy tasty artisan cone.

With this in mind, the company has launched a new tricolore cone, which it describes as a “real eye-catcher, designed to lure passing trade into your parlour”. The cone is a torino dipped in white chocolate and rolled in pink and blue sherbet.

Antonelli has also sculpted a new waffle cone. Taking its name from the sparkling wine, the Asti is a tall, slim elegant waffle cone with a champagne flute-like shape.

Great Taste 2014 Supreme Champion winner Snowflake Luxury Gelato is selling its gelato in retail tubs for the first time this spring. As well as the champion raspberry sorbetto, the range will comprise dark chocolate sorbetto, hazelnut, vanilla and sea salted caramel.

All will be available in 500ml and 120ml sized tubs.

For summer, Snowflake has come up with four new scooping flavours: peach sorbetto, an intense coffee gelato, dark chocolate & ginger sorbetto and peach, cantaloupe melon & ‘Torta de la Nona’, based on an Italian cake with pine nuts and custard cream.

www.antonelli.co.uk

www.snowflakegelato.co.uk

Cones to stop traffic

months, a raspberry sorbet and coconut & dark Belgian chocolate ice cream have joined New Forest Ice Cream’s range of over 50 ice creams and sorbets.

offering its Top 50 Foods damson and its pear & vanilla ice cream in 125ml pots. www.alder-tree.co.uk

l Mango & passionfruit sorbet and coffee & Kentish cobnut fudge ice cream are the latest inventions to come out of Simply Ice Cream’s kitchen. www.simplyicecream.co.uk

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

27

product focus Mendip Moments is thinking outside the tub, introducing what it believes are the first ice cream cupcakes (wholesale £2.40+VAT), in chocolate velvet, strawberry spring, amaretto machiatto and lemon lust flavours. The ‘base’ of the cupcake is made from ice cream, which is dipped in a chocolate cup and topped with a semifreddo mousse ‘icing’. www.mendipmoments.co.uk

ice cream

Remeo Gelato, the first “gelato in a jar”, is now available to UK food outlets via Stratford Fine Foods. Made in Italy and shipped fresh every week to the UK, the gelato uses pasteurised milk and a churning method that incorporates less air for a richer flavour, denser texture and 35% lower fat content than regular ice cream. Flavours include bourbon vanilla, dark chocolate with 72% cocoa, Italian caffe espresso with 30% liquid coffee, fresh Italian strawberries and pistacchio from Sicily. The RRP is £6.00-7.00 for 500ml and £2.50-3.00 for 100ml. www.stratfordfinefoods.com

Asian-inspired ice cream and sorbet producer Yee Kwan is poised for growth after her recent appearance on Dragon’s Den, when the former surveyor secured investment from Deborah Meaden.

Her range takes in over 20 flavours, including matcha green tea, lychee, lime & lemongrass, and her newest adventurous addition, durian – a pungent, custardy fruit from South East Asia.

Stocked in Whole Foods, Harvey Nichols, Wing Yip and Korea Foods, they have an RRP of £2.25 for 125ml and £5.50 for 500ml tubs. www.yeekwan.co.uk

Frozen food supplier Field Fare is linking up with ice cream producer Granny Gothards to launch a line of co-branded ice creams and sorbets. Initially, the range will focus on four flavours – strawberries & cream, chocolate chuckle, vanilla royal and honeycomb – plus a raspberry sorbet. All of them come in 500ml tubs (RRP £5.25) and are hand-made on Gothards Farm in Somerset. www.field-fare.com

www.creamandcountry.co

For shoppers who want to attempt making their own ice cream, Granny Gothards now offers home kits. Available in three flavours – Madagascan vanilla, Belgian chocolate and honeycomb crunch – the kits contain dry ingredients to make 3 litres of ice cream without an ice cream maker.

April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

inspired sorbets have picked up listings with London’s Partridges, Bayley & Sage and Ocado. www.lushicesorbet.com

l S.Luca of Musselburgh is now offering its Nut’ella and Ir’n Brew ice creams in single portion 120ml pots complete with spoon. www.s-luca.co.uk

l Vanilla brownie,

Casa Del Gelato’s scooping menu are: white chocolate & raspberry gelato, butterscotch gelato, raspberry & elderflower sorbetto, champagne sorbetto, and strawberry & lime sorbetto. www.casadelgelato.co.uk

l Following success with four- and five-star hotels in Ireland, chocolate & salted caramel and white chocolate & blackberry have been added to Glastry Farm’s 500ml retail tub ice cream range. www.glastryfarm.com

l Marshfield Farm has created

Purbeck Ice Cream is known for its unconventional flavours, and this year’s creations won’t disappoint, with Dorset wasabi and sweet fennel joining the company’s ‘spice rack’ collection.

The Dorset producer suggests pairing wasabi ice cream with strips of rare or dry-cured beef, and sweet fennel with white fish.

Both are available in 4-litre tubs (£20.15+VAT). www.purbeckicecream.co.uk

28

l Lushice cocktail-

l New additions to

New to ice cream… Cream & Country farms,” says founder Mark Murphy.

Cream & Country launched last summer and at present offers five flavours in 120ml spoon-in-lid pots with an RRP of £2. These are cream tea, rhubarb & stem ginger, salted caramel and New Forest gateau ice creams and Jenkyn Place English sparkling wine & elderflower sorbet.

www.sussexicecreamcompany.co.uk

www.moevenpick-icecream.co.uk

www.grannygothards.co.uk

Cream & Country has set out to ‘shake up’ speciality ice cream with products that are a celebration of “flavours and Britishness”.

“We bring a little ‘old school cool’ in a classic 100% natural ice cream recipe and mix it up with some really innovative flavours using fruit indigenous to these shores and only whole milk and cream from Hampshire dairy

Cream Company and Sussexbased distillery Chilgrove Gin have joined forces to produce a gin & grapefruit sorbet available exclusively at events and on special request.

created from Swiss cream and Madagascan bourbon vanilla enriched with pieces of brownie and caramel coulis, is Mövenpick’s newest flavour for restaurants.

Protein ice cream company Wheyhey! says healthy eating has become less of a chore with the launch of a new banoffee flavour. The “better for you” whey protein-based ice cream is already on sale in chocolate, vanilla and strawberry flavours in Whole Foods, Planet Organic, Ocado, Holland & Barrett and Musclefood, where it has an RRP of £6.50 for 500ml or £2.50 for 150ml. www.wheyhey.com

l Sussex Ice

three new ice cream flavours – salted caramel, candy floss crush and luscious lemon – and a new blueberry bliss FroYo frozen yoghurt for the scooping trade. www.marshfield-icecream.co.uk

l Summer 2015 will see new labels and a new raspberry cheesecake flavour from Staffordshire’s Needwood Ice Cream. www.nwicecream.co.uk

Vol.16 Issue 3 路 April 2015

29

product focus

ice cream

Following its launch last October in 117 Waitrose stores and on Ocado, newcomer Oppo is now keen to focus on building listings with independents for its guilt-free, coconut oil-based ice creams. The enterprise was started by two brothers, Harry and Charlie Thuillier, and became the fastest ever food and drink start-up to raise money through crowdfunding, closing its campaign with £300,000 and 197 investors. Each of the three flavours – mint choc swirl with spirulina, Madagascan vanilla & baobab and salted caramel flavour with lucuma – features a superfood. RRP £5.49 for 500ml. www.oppoicecream.co.uk

Jollyum is a newcomer to dairy-free ice cream and, following a successful launch in its Yorkshire homeland, is now rolling out its soya milk-based product to the rest of the UK. Certified organic by the Soil Association and gluten-free by Coeliac UK, Jollyum comes in passion fruit & chocolate, strawberry, maple & pecan and double chocolate flavours. It is available in 125ml (RRP £1.89) and 500ml (RRP £5.89) tubs from wholesalers Stratford Fine Foods, Suma Wholefoods and Queenswood Natural Foods. www.jollyum.com

The Coconut Collaborative is building on the success of its coconut milk yoghurts with the introduction of coconut milk frozen yoghurt.

Pitched as a healthy alternative to dairy ice cream, Snowconut comes in 500ml tubs in vanilla & coconut, raspberry, chocolate and mango flavours.

Brighton’s Gelato Gusto has teamed up with another Great Taste award-winner 200 yards down the road, tea mixologist Bluebird Tea Co, to produce gelato and sorbetto infused with their tea blends. The collaboration has yielded a dark chocolate & chilli chai gelato and a ‘cherry lips’ sorbetto – a blend of rose buds, cocoa shells, lemongrass & raspberry leaves. www.gelatogusto.com

www.coconutco.co.uk

Oliphant & Pomeroy has created a new boxed assortment of 12 miniature chocolate-coated ice creams (RRP £14) with four of their popular flavours: salted caramel, mango & passion fruit, pistachio and mandarin.

La Gelatiera is opening a central gelato production facility on the former Olympic site in London. The new unit will boast a 100 sq m gelato theatre/lab open to the public where people will be able to watch the artisan gelato-making process.

The lab will be HACCP compliant, allowing La Gelatiera to cater for any type of wholesale clients. In another development, the multiaward winning Italian gelato-maker has launched “unconventional cakes” – cupcakes, bespoke occasion cakes and wedding cakes hand-made entirely from gelato.

www.oliphantandpomeroy.co.uk

www.lagelatiera.co.uk

The language of taste...

combine tangy freshness with a creamy consistency and just enough sweetness.

If other flavours are incorporated, these should shine FIND OUT WHAT GREAT TASTE JUDGES LOOK FOR IN in their own right. If a flavour is KEY PRODUCT CATEGORIES, WITH SILVIJA DAVIDSON described as ‘apricot & honey’, Great Taste judges, and most stated flavours are the consumers, would expect to clearly Silky smooth and intense features that score highly. taste both, not something vaguely were the terms judges used in In just about every other iced sweet and fruity. selecting Snowflake’s raspberry dessert, ‘iciness’ – mostly perceived But back to simplicity – and sorbetto as 2014 Great Taste as an unyielding texture or as vanilla ice cream. Of course, Supreme Champion. It’s that magic noticeable ice crystals – is distinctly there’s rarely anything simple about combination of clear, vibrant undesirable. Refreshing, even ‘plain vanilla’, which can describe flavours and velvety melt zingy (like those everything from that wins over professionals and fruit lollies aimed commercial whippy consumers alike, whether we’re In just about every at kids) is fine; ‘icy’ fluff or dense, talking sorbets, ice creams or frozen is decidedly not. iced dessert, ‘iciness’ is emulsifier-assisted yoghurts. distinctly undesirable Frozen ‘clotted cream’ ices Of course, iced desserts may yoghurts might be to those revealing differ. Granitas, for example, should considered ‘better for you’ or lower the fine distinctions between be as granular and icy as the in fat, but we still expect them to Madagascan, Mexican and Tahitian term suggests, but even here the be indulgent. The best manage to vanilla. intensity and clarity of the

ICED DESSERTS

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

What is certain is that synthetic vanillin disguised by ground-up particles of flavourless pod won’t cut it with Great Taste judges or discerning consumers. Nor will emulsifiers replacing the richness of egg yolk. If milk, cream and eggs are local, great. Producers should say so. It wins plaudits from judges – once we’ve established the taste is terrific.

A word about chocolate. We’re growing much more discerning, so producers should use the good stuff, and then boast about it.

And a serious word about sugar.

Fat is fine; sugar is not so great, but necessary. A cloying effect, however, is terrible. Keep it clean and bright. We all want to want more ice cream.

• Food writer and editor Silvija Davidson is chief judging coordinator for the Great Taste awards.

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www.orkneyicecream.com | info@orkneyicecream.com Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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Award Winning Ice Creams, Sorbets & Frozen Yoghurts

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Christmas Pudding Ice Cream

Blackcurrant Sorbet

Chocolate Ice Cream

product focus

BBQs & outdoor dining our courtyards or at our Smoked & Uncut music festivals.

“We do this with a wood oven fuelled by sustainable wood, and mainly focus on cooking flatbread pizzas using Alan’s charcuterie, but also the 12 different varieties of home-grown tomatoes and chillies from our hot-house.

“It seems as if wood ovens are becoming more fashionable and affordable, with small producers like Alan buying mobile units to

Flame at last

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Mutton is a great meat for open-fire cookery Gill Meller

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Subbotina/Dreamstime.com

showcase their products at food events. Because they’re so versatile, they’re the perfect accessory to flavour, smoke, bake, roast, grill or sear food quickly and evenly.”

And as delicious magazine’s Susan Low tells FFD, wood-fired ovens are popping up in many back gardens too. “Some people are building these as fun DIY projects, others are buying them readymade,” she says. “They’re ideal for making bread and lightning-quick pizzas or, as they cool, for slowcooking roasted meats.”

With these, and the availability of pizza stones as an accessory to barbecues as well as indoor ovens, merchandising pizza ingredients suggested in Meller’s latest River together becomes a new way to Cottage handbook, Pigs & Pork. approach your summer display.

“The cold-smoke generator is a And don’t miss a chance to great piece of outdoor kit – cheap, accessorize around outdoor dining. portable and simple,” he says.

James Golding points out: “There are For those with a butchery lots of cast-iron pots and really cool, counter, Meller suggests steering retro, enameled orange dishes that shoppers towards mutton, which delis could stock and sell that fit well he describes as “a great meat for with a ‘grazing’ style of dining.” open-fire cookery”. “I make kebabs And Susan Low flags two from mutton and leave them in other functional but important spiced yoghurt and black onion accessories. “We all want to avoid seeds for a day or so before they the undercooked – but burnt – get taken to the fire. Great spices sausage. Digital probe thermometers to sell with mutton would be the are perfect for using outdoors.

Four Cs: cumin, caraway, coriander They’re fast and accurate, and take and chilli. A blend of those, with the guesswork out of determining some yoghurt and fresh coriander to when chicken or burgers are finish, always makes a great, wellproperly cooked. flavoured kebab.”

“And no outdoor shindig in the If smokers are one up-andUS or Australia is complete without coming addition to outdoor cooking an insulated coolbox, yet Brits have been slow There are lots of cool catch on to their pots and dishes that fit to manifold uses. They’re well with a ‘grazing’ ideal for transporting style of dining’ food from the shops, keeping it chilled James Golding for picnics – and for ensuring the beer and white wine kit, wood-fired ovens are another. stay properly chilled. Say ‘no’ to James Golding, chef-director at The warm beer!”

Pig boutique hotels and co-founder with Alan Bartlett of A Pinch Of www.bradleysmoker.co.uk Salt charcuterie (see Cut & Dried, www.rivercottage.net p23), tells FFD: “Outdoor dining www.thepighotel.com plays a major part in our summer www.englishsaffron.wix.com/ offer, whether on a daily basis in english-saffron

The sizzly season is almost upon us, and it won’t all be about bangers and burgers, says MICK WHITWORTH. How about stretching your definition of outdoor dining to includes pizzas or paella?

S

ummer will soon be stretching out before us, and while the weather may never quite match the picture in our heads, it’s a great chance to tap into the lifestyle longings of your customers.

It’s also a time to have some fun with creative merchandising of outdoor dining ingredients and accessories.

Sausages, burgers, chicken wings and steaks – and the sauces to accompany them – will always be the bankers, especially for farm shops with a butchery counter. And even for delis that don’t normally dabble in fresh meat, sausages are almost a guaranteed seller.

But why not look beyond the bangers and burgers to what chefs and lifestyle magazines are talking about this season, and merchandise ingredients together to match. You could even leave magazines and cook books open alongside them to reinforce those recipe suggestions.

At River Cottage in Devon, where many of the nation’s openair dining ideas are forged, group head chef Gill Meller says paella is a dish that works well in the great outdoors, and presents plenty of selling opportunities for delis and farm shops.

While Meller and Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall cook their paella over wood fires on the shingle beaches of Lyme Bay, adding homemade

chorizo and chicken from River Cottage’s Park Farm HQ to locally caught shellfish, many delis already sell paella pans that will fit neatly onto a garden barbecue, and these

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People are building woodfired ovens as DIY projects Susan Low

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can be used to create an effective visual display.

“I’d suggest selling a really good smoked paprika alongside a paella pan,” says Meller, “with bomba rice and some saffron from our friend David Smale at English Saffron.”

Shops with a kitchen on-site could also make try making their own chorizo, with some free range or organic pork mince. And if that’s a bridge too far, why not merchandise one of our many British artisan chorizos alongside those other paella components?

Farm shops that already sell barbecues could think about tapping into the Bradley smoker range, says Meller. This includes hot-smokers priced at anything from £350 to £550, but also takes in cold-smoke generators (around £35) that can be used as an accessory to produce smoked mackerel or bacon on any covered barbie – as

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Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

33

New Luxury Mayonnaises from Mary Berry’s

Made using the finest ingredients including free range eggs, these mayonnaises are perfect for the upcoming BBQ season. Ideal for burgers, wraps & salads.

Variants available: Luxury Mayonnaise and Luxury Herb Mayonnaise.

No artifical colours, flavours and preservatives.

www.maryberrysfoods.co.uk 34

April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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Fantastic range of products ideal for outdoor dining and BBQ’s – marinades, dressings, dips and chilli jam all bursting with flavour

product focus

BBQs & outdoor dining

Grilling in America There’s more to US barbecue than just pulled pork and sticky ribs. Having toured the states extensively, NICK BAINES outlines the myriad of cooking styles and looks at how UK retailers might capitalise on the growing trend.

U

ntil recently, British barbecues were often an uninspiring affair, notorious for their blackened burgers and sooty sausages. However, American styles have been slowly infiltrating our al fresco summer cooking for a while and things like pulled pork have become a mainstream menu item.

I’ve spent a lot of time immersed in American barbecue culture. I’ve eaten more smoked meat than is considered healthy and travelled through the barbecue states extensively, spending time with pitmasters from Texas to North Carolina and discovered just how diverse the cooking methods can be.

The universal element that all styles of American barbecue share is hot smoking at low temperatures for a long period of time. ‘Low and slow’ is the barbecue mantra. Ribs typically smoke for around three hours, chickens for around two and pulled pork and brisket for anything from five hours up to 12.

Experimenting with different wood flavours is all part of the fun and bags of pecan, hickory and apple wood chips are available from brand leaders like Weber. These can be sold alongside charcoal and tied into promotions with rubs, sauces and joints of meat.

However, beyond the intrinsic smoking, things start to vary depending on where in the US you actually are. Kansas City-style barbecue is the one most are familiar with. We’re talking sweet smoky sauces and racks of pork ribs. These ribs will have been covered in a complex rub of spices, herbs, sugars and salts prior to smoking, then glazed or sauced during the last hour in the smoker, which gives them a sweet, sticky “bark” or crust.

ES’ PULLED NICK BAINE TIALS PORK ESS N

Pigs’ KC All Three Little ub R e Purpos nd or er cuts – ha Pork should full shoulder s 3kg ry wood chip Weber Hicko Sauce riginal BBQ Cowtown O e wood uld leave th (NB: You co d the p this grou an lts chips out of eld good resu yi ill w ts ingredien ) en ov e cooked in th

As well as the famous pulled pork and ribs, American barbecue meats include beef, chicken and ‘links’ (sausages)

In Tennessee, you’ll encounter Memphis-style dry ribs, which leave out the glazing step. Memphis is also the benchmark for pulled pork, which is almost always sauced after being pulled.

Texas is all about the cow. You order smoked brisket and beef sausage links down here. Rubs are basic in the Lone Star State, often just salt and pepper, and if you put sauce on your meat, in some places it implies that it isn’t very good.

In northern Alabama, you’ll find a lot of chicken and a regional sauce for them made from mayonnaise and pickle juice. In the Carolinas the best places smoke whole hogs, selling meat by the pound, or in small buns with slaw and a barbecue sauce that varies depending on where you happen to be. Some have a base of vinegar, others a base of mustard.

The gateway meat when preparing American barbecue at home is undoubtedly pork. Many recipes for pulled pork call for pork butt, also known as the Boston butt.

Confusingly, this is an American butchery term for the pork shoulder rather than the rear end of a pig.

Pulled pork can actually be prepared in the oven and though it’ll lack that all-important smoke characteristic, it’s a great way to dip your toes in the water.

Ribs are always popular, so when selling racks of spare ribs, retailers

should look at preparing them St. Louis style. This entails removing the rib tips and sternum bone, leaving a clean rectangular sheet. There’s no benefit to flavour but they look more appetizing and having this cheap cut prepared properly will up your barbecue game and bring a little authority to your offering.

Carrying imported barbecue rubs and sauces from the US also delivers some authenticity to your barbecue offer. Brands like Three Little Pigs, Rufus Teague and Cowtown all

Large wood-fired smokers are the key to US barbecue but UK consumers can achieve good results on smaller apparatus, including domestic ovens

make bona fide rubs and sauces, which are now imported into the UK by wholesaler BBQ Gourmet.

Rubs and sauces like these are key ingredients for both newcomers and seasoned pros alike. They bring the flavour of American barbecue even if you aren’t smoking and two or three of these can be bundled into a gift pack or promotional deal.

If creating your own barbecue rubs, start with a strong base of smoked paprika, salt and brown sugar. Common additions are garlic and celery salts, dried herbs and cayenne. Whatever you add, you must keep the sweetness high.

If your customers are setting themselves up for some low and slow barbecue, then the sides can be a tempting convenience purchase.

Sides at barbecue joints in the US are in short supply, but vibrant slaws feature heavily. For instance, at Payne’s BBQ in Memphis, you’ll find a tangy mustard-based slaw the colour of piccalilli. Over in Lexington, North Carolina, you’ll find a slaw made with ketchup instead of mayonnaise.

Prepared slaws can be marketed alongside barbecue essentials, not to mention desserts like peach cobbler, banana pudding and fruit pies.

American-style barbecue takes time, but as the smoker puffs on the patio and you while away the hours with a beer or two, you can rest assured the results are always worth waiting for.

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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Enter the fast-growing UK market for real barbecue with Championship-winning BBQ rubs and sauces from the United States.

BBQ Gourmet ing will be launch il ta re EE FR their on display stands the Farm Stand S71 at Show li De & op Sh .

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

For more information on delicious hot & chilled Tg Green Teas visit www.drinktg.com, call on 0800 7723885 or email hello@drinktg.com

product focus

BBQs & outdoor dining

Foodie ideas for the summer season The Yorkshire Crisp Company is the latest savoury snack producer to move into popcorn with the launch of three toffee-coated varieties. Luxury toffee, strawberry & cherry toffee, and coconut toffee are all ideal as summer nibbles. All three locally made, all-natural flavours come in 90g re-sealable drums. They have already gained listings in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s West End theatres alongside the producer’s crisps. www.yorkshire-crisps.co.uk

Steenbergs says its range of BBQ rubs and seasonings is perfect for the outdoor eating and barbecue season.

Hand-blended and packaged in the company’s own eco-factory in North Yorkshire, the unique blends are inspired by world flavours and showcase Steenbergs’ aromatic, organic and fairly traded spices.

There are a variety of heat strengths across the blends for meat, fish and vegetables, including the “piquant” Piri-Piri, “soulful” Southern Fried Chicken, Smoky Pork Rub, the hot Cajun Ragin’ and sweet Salmon Rub. Prices range from £2.45 to £2.65 (45g-70g) depending on variety. www.steenbergs.co.uk

As consumer tastes for spicy and exotic flavours grow, The Bay Tree continues to develop new lines that embrace these trends. Its latest addition, Roquito Chilli Spicy Sauce, has been designed to spice up the barbecue season with its “fragrant hotness and subtle sweetness”, whether that’s for pouring on hot dogs and burgers or marinating ribs and chicken wings. Available in 250g bottles, the sauce can also be added to vegetable stir-fries. www.thebaytree.co.uk

Tenuta Marmorelle’s ZERO unfiltered extra virgin olive oil is produced using the company’s own olives from groves in Puglia, southern Italy. The harvest takes place in early November when the olives are just ripe and they are cold-pressed on the same day.

This Great Taste two-star oil is well-suited for dressing salads, garnishing barbecued meat or served with fresh bread and balsamic vinegar.

BBQ’s are incomplete without Ornamental Ginger & Soy Sauce, according to its maker Scarlett & Mustard. The Suffolk producer’s sauce (cases of 6x250ml, £16.74) can be used to marinade pork and steak or to dress tuna or salmon. It can also be poured over avocados or new potatoes or deployed as a dip for rustic bread.

Scarlett & Mustard also recommends its chilli jam (6x200g, £13.50) with sausages or mixed with cream cheese as a dip.. www.scarlettandmustard.co.uk

www.tenutamarmorelle.com

Nizami Foods produces a range of Great Taste award-winning sauces, chutneys and oils with an Indian twist. All of its lines are free from gluten, wheat and dairy.

The range includes the Spanishinspired Moho Sauce, Romesco Sauce, and for heat lovers there’s the “fiery” Hot Moho. The sauces are ideal as marinades for the BBQ season and come in retail cases of 6x275g (RRP £3.99 per jar).

Spicentice says its rubs offer great shelf appeal and excellent linked sales for retailers this barbecue season. Chipotle, Chimichurri, Barbecue, Peppery, Tandoori, Ras el Hanout, Harissa, Italian and Herby Fish are all gluten-free and prepared from A-grade ingredients at the company’s BRC-accredited, nut-free HQ. Every tub includes ideas on how to rub, sprinkle, paste, crumb, baste, marinade and glaze using the 100% pure herbs & spices in each blend.

Each unit has an RRP of £2.50 and Spicentice can provide free merchandising units.

www.nizamifoods.co.uk

www.spicentice.com

Dressings and condiments specialist Lucy’s Dressings is launching a new range of lower calorie dressings, developed in response to consumer demand. Initially available in Ocado, the new Slim range features lower calorie versions of Lucy’s two best-sellers – Light Asian and French Bliss.

Light Raspberry joins Slim Light Asian and Light French to complete the line-up. In place of the oils and processed sugars often found in dressings, Lucy’s has combined fruit (limes, lemons and raspberries) and vinegar (rice wine and white wine) with seasonings, like ginger, chilli and cracked black pepper, to ensure that the slim products still deliver on taste. The dressings can also be used in stir-fries, with noodles or in chicken and fish dishes. www.lucysdressings.co.uk

“Honouring the King of Vanillas from Madagascar”, Luscombe has recently launched Madagascan Vanilla Soda. A twist on the age-old classic, the Devon-based producer’s new sparkling drink combines the floral edges of Muscat grape juice with spring water, Sicilian lemon and organic Madagascan vanilla extract. Luscombe says this addition to its No Added Sugar range is the “perfect” soft drink for barbecues.

It comes in 32cl screw-top bottles and joins other recently launched flavours – Passionate Ginger Beer and Damascene Rose Bubbly – in the producer’s growing line-up. www.luscombe.co.uk

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CMT

Continental Meat Technology Gluten free rusk substitute from CMT CMT introduces a revolutionary new gluten free crumb, which can replace conventional rusk in sausages and burgers or can be used as a coating for meat and poultry products.

Are your customers looking for a nutritious delicious breakfast cereal? Our tasty granolas are wheat free, salt free, low sugar, high fibre. Try our new range of gluten free granolas, porridges and Mueslis also.

We ship nationwide.

CMT gluten free crumbs:

• Are suitable for celiacs • Replace rusk without the need for recipe changes • Are also available as ready made CMT sausage mixes • Are available in two natural colours (pale and golden brown) • Do not contain any e numbers • Are made from GMO free ingredients.

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3 015_160315_FineFood_141.5mmx204mm.indd 1

/yumshsnacks

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product focus

free-from foods

Health and good fortune LYNDA SEARBY seeks out the latest products for growing your free-from and health food ranges Isle of Man producer Berries has become the latest luxury pudding maker to introduce a gluten-free Christmas pudding. Available in both 1lb and 2lb sizes, the pudding is matured for six months using a VSOP cognac. A 1lb pudding is priced at £6.50 (RRP £11) and a 2lb pudding is priced at £9.60 (RRP £16). Minimum order value is £250 and Berries will provide extra puddings free of charge to assist with in-store tastings.

l Rubylicious beet balls and green supreme kale balls are the two newest additions to Raw Health’s line of spherical organic energy snacks. www.windmillorganics.com

l With an RRP of

www.berries.co.im

The Kent-based Artisan Bread Organic (ABO) bakery has gone completely gluten-free and introduced five highly original new product lines. Oatie breakfast bread (135g, trade £1.42), pitched as a healthy breakfast for people on the go, is fermented for 12-15 hours without added yeast, fat or sugar. Mushroom glutini, a fermented quinoa and mushroom baked snack that can be eaten hot or cold, has a trade price of £2.54 for 115g. Seaweed slices (140g, trade £2.54), which combine five different seaweeds, are another on-the-go snack. Sweet and crunchy tigernuts, or chufas – as they are known in Spain – are fibre-rich, chocolate-free cookies sweetened with date syrup. They come in cans of 13 (trade £9.78) and six (trade £4.76). Lastly, Whitstable beer & seaweed crackers are oyster shell-shaped gourmet rice crackers. The inclusion of organic gluten-free beer gives shine and a bittersweet flavour. Small tubs have a trade price of £1.16 while large tubs have a trade price of £2.06. www.artisanbread-abo.com

Building on the success of the original Choc Shot, the UK’s first liquid hot chocolate, Choc Shot orange spice (orange & cardamom) and coconut launched in February.

Choc Shot is dairy-free and 95% fat-free and is sweetened with Sweet Freedom, a natural vegan sugar alternative made from fruit. It comes in a 320g squeezy bottle with an RRP of £3.59 and a trade price of £2.15.

Organic, gluten-free, suitable for vegans and made with Fairtrade Peruvian quinoa, Quinola Mothergrain’s new readymeals for kids (RRP £1.99) tick a lot of boxes. Described as “a tasty, nourishing and guilt-free alternative for parents when they don’t have time to whip up a homemade dish”, the microwaveable pouches are targeted at busy, health-conscious parents. Mediterranean quinoa with tomato, courgette & carrot, Tex Mex quinoa with kidney beans, sweetcorn & tomato and Thai quinoa with peas, carrots & coconut milk are the three dishes in the range.

£10.95, Jessica Bakes-Well’s new gluten-free brownie mix in a jar is the perfect price point for gifting. jessicabakeswell@ gmail.com

l The Foodamentalist mixes for gluten-free Yorkshire pudding, Southern fried coating and chip shop style curry sauce mixes launched with Cotswold Fayre in January. www.foodamentalists.co.uk

www.quinola.com

Best known for its café cookies, Australian brand Byron Bay Cookies is sharpening its retail focus with new pre-packed gluten-free cookies and crispbreads. Baked in the UK, the 150g cookie boxes come in triple choc fudge, white choc chunk & macadamia nut, and strawberries & clotted cream (RRP £2.49). Already popular in Australia owing to their wafer thin crisp texture, the crispbreads are available in two flavours: natural and rosemary & sea salt (RRP £1.89).

l There’s no need for anyone to miss out on a teatime treat following the launch of a glutenand wheat-free fruitcake from The Bay Tree. www.thebaytree.co.uk

www.byronbaycookies.co.uk

Munchy Seeds has made its Choccy apricot snack available in 25g snack pouch format (RRP £0.89; trade price £0.60). The seed specialist also launches a new ‘superfoods’ inspired line this month. Super Sprinkles (475g) is a mix of chia, linseed, sunflower, pumpkin with blueberries, cranberries, mango, goji berries and coconut. www.munchyseeds.co.uk

www.chocshot.co.uk

Creative Nature’s cold pressed ‘superfood’ snack bars are said to be packed with 100% natural ingredients, with no added sugar, sweeteners, agave or syrup, and not overloaded with dates. The four bars in the range – Blissful Berry, Heavenly Cacao, Sublime Seed and Tropical treabar – will be labelled as gluten-free by the end of the year. RRP £0.99; trade price £0.69. www.creativenaturesuperfoods.com

l AussieMite is offering its 300g jar to independents at an introductory price of £4.35 (RRP £2.25). The savoury spread will also launch in smaller 110g pots and portion packs later this year. www. aussiemite. com.au

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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Country Puddings Lodge Farm, Dacre, Penrith, Cumbria, CA11 0HH tel: 017684 80864 fax: 017684 80249 email: info@countrypuddings.co.uk

www.countrypuddings.co.uk

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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product focus Honeybuns says that with its new gluten-free cornbread mix, cornbread muffins, toad in the hole and croutons are easy to make – by adding eggs, butter and a splash of milk.The mix, which is based on a blend of polenta, sorghum flour and tapioca flour, has an RRP of £3.69 per 220g tube. The trade price is £1.94. www.honeybuns.co.uk

free-from foods Breaded fish is no longer out of bounds for food intolerance sufferers, thanks to Feel Free.

The Worthing-based producer has introduced frozen cod fillets, hake fillets and pollock nuggets made with 100% fish fillet coated in a crispy maize crumb that is free from gluten, wheat, dairy, egg and soya.

RRPs are £3.99 for two cod fillets, £3.99 for two hake fillets and £2.49 for nine pollock nuggets. www.feelfreefoods.co.uk

Vegan patisserie Ruby’s of London is looking to expand into the wholesale market. The patisserie, which bakes wheat-, gluten- and refined sugar-free cakes, desserts and biscuits, is currently selling its wares online and at Greenwich market. www.rubysoflondon.com

Healthfoods has milled flax, chia seed, apple and cinnamon to make a powder that can be stirred into porridge, cereal, muesli, yoghurts, smoothies or baking recipes to give a health and flavour boost. www.linwoodshealthfoods.com

l Musk’s gluten-

Deli-cafés looking to cater for coeliacs should check out Bridor’s new gluten-free frozen baked goods collection, which comprises two bread rolls (one seeded), a small all-butter brioche and an all-butter madeleine.

The French bakery specialist has replicated the textural properties of their gluten-containing counterparts with a blend of millet, rice and buckwheat flours. www.bridor.co.uk

Ginger Bakers of Kendal has given the brownie a healthy twist, with the creation of a gluten-free berry & beetroot version. Despite the wholesome ingredients, the bakery says the brownie is satisfyingly rich and fudgy. Ginger Bakers has also introduced packaging and shelf-ready boxes for its dairy- and gluten-free 70g Almondie biscuit, which is currently sold unwrapped.

Trade price is £11.50 for a box of 10. www.honeybuns.co.uk

Raw chocolate producer Ombar is now selling its dairy-free Coco Mylk chocolate as buttons.

Available in cases of 15x25g bags (£13.95, RRP £1.49 each), the chocolate is a blend of raw cacao with organic coconut sugar and coconut cream.

l Linwoods

Tideford Organics’ new ‘superfood’ soups, launched in time for spring and summer, are said to be packed full of powerful antioxidants, vitamins and minerals. The five new recipes are organic, low fat, low salt, and wheat- and gluten-free and include combinations such as beetroot & pomegranate, and watercress, spirulina & lemon. www.tidefordorganics.com

www.ombar.co.uk

New to free-from…

Free’ist

Kent & Fraser says it can barely keep up with demand for its new Criscuits, a thin-cut, gluten-free cheese savoury. There are four varieties: hot chilli pepper, coriander & lime, cracked black pepper & smoked sea salt, oaksmoked garlic & black poppy seeds and roasted onion & nigella seeds.

RRP £2.55 for 110g. www.kentandfraser.com

free sausages have been relaunched in new packaging, which states that they are also dairyfree. www.musks.com

l Wold Top Brewery’s new gluten-free beer, marmalade porter, is described as a complex, rich, dark porter with a sweet malty base, overtones of bitter orange and hints of coffee and chocolate. www.woldtopbrewery. co.uk

Years of research and taste testing have yielded a gluten-free, bronzedrawn, slow-dried pasta that is said to have the same qualities as a traditional pasta. Marketed under the Tenuta Marmorelle label, the pasta is made by combining cornflour and rice flour with traditional techniques. This has resulted in pasta that is the same colour as conventional pasta – unlike corn flour, rice flour and brown rice flour pastas – and doesn’t fall apart during cooking. There are 10 shapes to choose from, including penne, spaghetti and lasagna. Trade prices range from £2.27 to £3.86 for a 500g bag. www.tenutamarmorelle.com

PACKAGING MAKEOVERS: Savvy’s line-up of luxury all-natural spreads and Viva’s range of wellbeing drinks are both sporting new looks. www.savvyspreads.com www.vivadrinks.com

The free-from market is very fragmented, made up of lots of smaller players focusing on single product categories. Belfast start-up Free’ist is taking a broader approach, with a portfolio of sugar-free products that covers a number of categories. This way, it says it offers retailers and consumers a solution to their needs all from one brand. So far, it offers 13 products spanning cookies, wafers, chocolates and jams, which are listed with retail groups throughout Northern and Southern Ireland. www.freeist.co.uk Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

41

BERRIES

ISLE OF MAN

Makers of handcrafted, Award Winning Christmas Puddings Overall Runner Up

All puddings are made to the highest of standards using the finest ingredients worldwide.

We supply high-end delis, luxury food halls, supermarkets and hamper companies.

Branding with private label and bespoke recipe development available.

To discuss: – Please Telephone: 01624 838384 or Email: info@berries.co.im

“Serious about Christmas Puddings.”

Handmade Speciality Cakes from Sussex Taste without compromise

Award winning chutneys and pickles

Wholesalers of handmade highest quality gluten free, dairy free and vegan cakes from our family bakery on the South Downs. Produced from the finest ingredients to our own recipes and independently tested.

Handmade in the W est Country If you would like to stock our products, or find out more about us then please do get in touch.

Email: sales@inapicklefoodco.co.uk Call: +44 (0) 1225 722255 or +44 (0) 7507 798373

www.inapicklefoodco.co.uk 42

April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

Please get in touch for more information 01273 858656 | info@atasteofdreams.co.uk

www.atasteofdreams.co.uk

show preview Get your health kicks

vegan, vegetarian, free from, and special diet food and drink – alongside three other non-food sections: Natural Beauty & Spa, Natural Living and Natural Health.

Currently, more than 600 exhibitors are signed up across the show and in excess of 10,000 visitors – including buyers from Waitrose, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Abel & Cole, Whole Foods Market and Planet Organic – are expected over the course of two days.

A host of new products will be debuted at the show, including organic sea buckthorn jam from Erbology (stand R42), Aduna’s baobab and moringa pouches (A51) and Natasha’s Living Food’s latest

raw food product the Venus Bar (Q14E).

Stur Drinks will be exhibiting its range of zero calorie natural water enhancers while, on the snack front, Clearspring (J50A) will be sampling its seaveg crispies and EasyBean (R10) will be unveiling its chickpea crispbread snack packs.

Other new products includes Booja Booja’s (J50-J) chilled truffle collection, hibiscus coconut rum on the Made in Montana stand (J60-K,L,M) and the curiously named Four Thieves Vinegar from French firm Mondial Uberti’s (Q47).

The growth of organic and special dietary food sales across the nation has been reflected in

Need to know

How do I get there?

When?

Situated in Docklands, ExCel London is accessible via London Underground and the Docklands Light Railway. Take the Jubilee line to Canning Town and change to the Beckton-bound DLR, alighting at Custom House, the main station serving Excel.

You can also get there using the Thames Clipper river boat service to the O2 from all major piers (London Bridge, Greenwich, Canary Wharf, Embankment and Waterloo), crossing the river on The Emirates Air Line cable car.

If travelling by car, follow signs for Royal Docks, City Airport and

Freshly located at London’s ExCeL, this year’s show will see food and drink featuring prominently

T

his year, Natural & Organic Products Europe has moved across the Capital to ExCeL London and will boast an extra 10% of exhibition space for food and drink producers.

The event, which takes place on April 19 and 20, plays host to The Natural Food Show – the UK’s only dedicated trade show for natural, organic, fair trade, sustainable,

April 19-20 Venue ExCeL London, 1 Western Gateway, Royal Victoria Dock, London Docklands, E16 1XL

this year’s submissions for the New Product Showcase, with over 60% of the 300 entries coming from food and drink companies.

These products can also enter the New Product Showcase Awards, which will be decided by visitors’ votes on Sunday April 19 with winners crowned at a ceremony on the same evening.

Among the new features for 2015’s show are international pavilions featuring companies from Poland, the Galicia region of Spain, and the Hellenic Pavilion (including the Cyclades Islands, Crete and the Greek mainland). These join France, Italy, Sicily, and the USA, which boasts a new section dedicated to ‘Big Sky Country’ Montana.

International organisation Slow Food will also have a new pavilion joining Organic Chilled Food (Soil Association) and Raw Food as well as members of The OTB (Organic Trade Board), The Vegan Society, and Demeter Biodynamic.

The Natural Products Live Theatre will host a variety of speakers, including nutritionist Patrick Holford, women’s health specialist Dr Marilyn Glenville and Conscious Food founder Kristina Locke. Other speakers on the bill are Retail Performance Specialists chairman Dennis Reid and Viridian’s technical director Ben Brown, who is also the author of The Digestive Health Solution.

As in previous years, the exclusive trade launch of the Soil Association’s annual Organic Market Report will also take place at the show.

Vistors will also have access to Natural Beauty & Spa seminars and live Natural Food Kitchen demonstrations at the show.

The Natural Food Trade Show is also launching a new, live juicing competition for 2015. The UK’s Juicing Championship, sponsored

by Juico, will see professional juicers compete to be crowned the UK Juicing Champion 2015 on April 19. The winner will claim national recognition as the industry’s top juicer and win a Juico juicer worth over £300. www.naturalproducts.co.uk

ExCel, or put E16 1DR into the sat nav. There is onsite pay and display parking for 3,700 cars.

The closest airport is London City airport, a 5 minute drive away.

How do I register?

Register for this trade-only event at www.naturalproducts.co.uk Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

43

The Hollandaise sauce concentrate is perfect for asparagus season and for eggs benedict and the Peppercorn will perfect a steak dinner.

Just add milk to the contents of the pot, or milk and cream for a more luxurious taste, then heat and whisk until the sauce thickens.

A quick and easy way to add a sensational sauce to your meals.

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At Nudie, we only hand select the finest, fresh slices of coconut, carefully toast them to perfection and hey voila, scrumptious little morsels of goodness.

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

shelf talk

products, promotions & people

More fruit and less sugar as Womersley overhauls vinegars

By MICHAEL LANE

a sugar reduction with production partner Somerset Cuisine, who he began working with in late 2013.

While the improved vinegars were “perfected” last year, the first bottles are expected to begin rolling out in April.

Parsons used the time in between to enter several flavours into Great Taste 2014, securing three stars each for the revised raspberry and golden raspberry &

Easier access to Easy Bean

Re-branded Topping targets sales growth with hot pies

Easy Bean has launched its range of naturally gluten-free chickpea cripsbreads in a 30g snack pack format.

The new packs (RRP £1.29) come in branded counter-top packaging holding 12 units and will be on show at this month’s Natural & Organic Products Europe show.

Made using chickpea flour rather than wheat flour, the crispbreads are gluten-free, wheat free, high in fibre and suitable for vegetarians.

The Somerset-based producer said chickpeas’ low GI makes them a slow-release source of energy and ideal for a midmorning or post-work snack.

By MICHAEL LANE

www. easybean. co.uk

Jamie Harris

Fruit vinegar specialist Womersley has relaunched its entire line-up with higher fruit content and revamped packaging as it looks to continue its progress since relocating production from Yorkshire 18 months ago.

The new recipe vinegars, which now feature less sugar and more fruit, will be available in the brand’s established 250ml bottles and new 100ml bottles in a similar, more shelf-friendly shape.

Womersley has also launched a new website featuring recipe ideas and an online shop.

“The vinegars have been relatively popular over the years but with all the publicity about sugar levels in our diet I came to the conclusion that our levels were too high,” said Womersley MD Rupert Parsons. “They are supposed to be vinegars after all.”

“The names are going to stay the same,” he added. “We’re just going to be marketing them as ‘new fruitier flavours’.”

He told FFD that feedback about the sweetness of the vinegars, from both retail customers and chefs, had also encouraged him to pursue

Rupert Parsons has overseen a tweak to the recipes of Womersley’s range of vinegars, which will now be available in new bottles

in North Yorkshire – had worked out well although the recipe redevelopment had taken a long time.

“It’s quite a challenge when you’ve only got three ingredients – fruit, vinegar and sugar,” he said.

With some development capacity freed up, Parsons said he hoped to work on some new ideas as well as create some gift packs for retail.

While the majority of Womersley’s sales are to retailers, Parsons said he would like to work with more chefs, because they “get” the products, but he is also looking to increase exports and tap into the growing trend for using vinegar in drinks, both soft and alcoholic. www.womersleyfoods.com

The Topping Pie Co is looking to boost sales in the UK and abroad after a re-brand and a raft of new product development, including pork pies for weddings and a range of hot pies.

The Doncaster-based business has invested around £20,000 in an upgrade of its branding, launching a new website and installing new production equipment.

The company, which has long been a supplier of pork pies to Selfridges and Booths, has created a number of new ranges, including an upgraded pre-packed range, but its premium hot eating pies represent one of the biggest departures.

Sales & marketing director Matthew Topping told FFD it was the business’s three South Yorkshire shops that led it to branch out from its traditional cold eating pies.

“It all started out with our own shops because we didn’t want to buy things in and customers were asking what else we do,” he said, adding that Topping’s retail background also informed the competitive price point of £2.50 per pie.

apache chilli flavours and one star for the orange & mace variety, The range will still come in 250ml and 100ml bottles but the latter will now be shorter and wider than the old tall, thin 100ml bottles, which Parsons said were difficult to merchandise.

Parson said the move to Highbridge-based Somerset Cuisine – enforced by the financial difficulties of his previous producer

what’s in the range Womersley’s range consists of: raspberry; golden raspberry & apache chilli; cherry; blackberry; strawberry & mint; blackcurrant & rosemary; orange & mace; lime, black pepper & lavender; and lemon, bay, basil & juniper vinegars.

Hot eating pies and Groom’s Pies are just some of the new lines Topping has developed

“We’re a business in South Yorkshire, we’re the poor cousin,” he said. “It is a bit price conscious here and we’re mindful that it is a bit tough at the moment.”

The range already includes flavours like rump steak with shallots and Portobello mushroom but Topping said the company is working on a number of new flavours including beef & golden ale and chicken in cream & white wine with pancetta.

The company is also looking

to offer its three-tier Groom’s Pie service to consumers via deli counters. It currently offers the pork pie wedding cakes in three tiers of circular pies (1.1kg, 2.7kg, 4 kg), in a variety of flavours, with a trade price of £130 and an RRP £250. It has also developed heart-shaped pies for this format.

Topping is also adding to its Dinky Pies range (120g, trade 89p-98p) with a number of new flavours in the pipeline. www.toppingspies.co.uk

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

45

shelf talk

Looking for suppliers accredited by the Guild of Fine Food?

Follow the logo

Top chefs tell CLARE HARGREAVES their deli essentials

Merangz reduces wastage with liquid yolk for chefs

By MICHAEL LANE

The bakers behind the Merangz brand have come up with a new product to put all of those otherwise discarded egg yolks to good use – a liquid egg mix for chefs and home cooks.

While the whites from all of its hand-separated free-range eggs go into its flavoured meringues, Merangz is now also pasteurising the yolks to produce ready-to-use mix branded The Egg Project.

Available in 1 litre bottles (RRP £6-£6.50), the liquid egg yolks can be deployed in the kitchen to make a range of dishes, from curds and ice creams to mayonnaise and Yorkshire puddings.

Each bottle contains 50 yolks and has a shelf life of seven days once opened.

All of Merangaz eggs are sourced from local Shropshire supplier Hollowdene Hens, which has Freedom Food accreditation.

“Like Merangz, there will be many busy kitchens where chefs, cooks and caterers only require the egg yolks or the egg whites for their recipes,” said Merangz owner Brian Crowther. “That is why we are launching our free range liquid egg yolks – a kitchen staple with local provenance which also just happens to be environmentally-friendly too.

“Now the egg yolks that we don't need can be used by those that do.

The end result is great shell-egg taste without the waste. It’s win, win!" www.merangz.co.uk

Dilly & Wolf snack range taps into British pulses

By MICHAEL LANE

Following a soft launch last summer, snack brand Dilly & Wolf has unveiled a threestrong range of its pulse-based Chisps in revamped flavours and packaging.

Free from artificial flavours, the range is all made in Britain with a blend of spelt, chickpeas and British fava beans from producer Hodemedods and is suitable for vegetarians.

Hebridean Sea Salt, seaweed & vinegar and the Indian-inspired sweet & spicy chickpea are joined by mature cheddar, pumpkin & poppy seed. All come in re-sealable 35g tubs (RRP £1.75).

All of Dilly & Wolf’s ingredients are sourced responsibly and, where possible, directly from producers.

The company uses healthier cooking methods, such as baking and roasting, which it says achieves the best flavour.

Born out of a collaboration between TV presenter Ben Fogle, his wife and ex-Marks & Spencer product developer Annabel Vere Nicoll, Dilly & Wolf has chosen to use pulses as its base ingredient given their low carbon footprint and sustainable growing credentials.

The producer will soon be adding two British-grown Power Pulses, including its take on wasabi peas. www.dillyandwolf.com

BIGGER BOTTLES: Folkington’s has made two additions to its 1 litre range.

Due to popular demand, the brand – produced by Metro Drinks – has included its unique apple juice, blended from English Russet and Jonagored apples. The other variety is a new Best of British Summer Berries made from British raspberries, strawberries and blackcurrants. Both varieties come in cases of six bottles (trade £2.10+VAT, RRP £3.75 each) www.folkingtons.com

46

April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

CHEF’S SELECTION Marcus McGuinness Auberge du Lac, Brocket Hall, Hertfordshire www.aubergedulac.co.uk

Marcus joined Auberge du Lac from Claude Bosi’s two-Michelin-starred Mayfair restaurant, Hibiscus, where he was head chef and Bosi’s right-hand man for six years. During his time at Hibiscus, he starred on BBC 2’s Great British Menu (2012). Previously, Marcus spent two years as sous chef at the twoMichelin-starred La Champignon Sauvage in Cheltenham.

Dr Burnorium’s Extraordinary Psycho juice 70% Ghost Pepper www.hotsauceemporium.co.uk

One of our guys found this chilli sauce online and that was it. I’m a real chillihead. This sauce contains 70% Naga pepper so you need to handle it with great care! I bang a bit of it in my sandwiches at home, and for my birthday I was given a three-box set. It’s much too fiery to use in the restaurant.

St Helen’s Farm salted goat’s butter www.sthelensfarm.co.uk

I have a lactose intolerant daughter so at home we just eat goats’ dairy – butter, milk, yoghurt and double cream. I cook with goats’ butter at home as it has more flavour. The guys at St Helen’s farm in the Vale of York make it by churning the milk cream in a large stainless steel vessel which drains off the buttermilk and thickens the cream. Salt is added to help the flavour and preserve the butter.

Capreolus Dorset air-dried ham www.capreolusfinefoods.co.uk

I came across Capreolus at Cannon & Cannon in Borough Market and now I go to them direct. The Dorset air-dried ham is fantastic; the ham comes from legs of Oxford Sandy & Black pigs reared nearby and their diet is supplemented with milk whey from the dairy that makes Dorset Blue Vinney cheese. The ham is airdried for many months (often more than a year). It goes toe to toe with the finest Spanish stuff. I use it in a simple salad with apple, radish, burned apple caramel and a ‘pig cake’ that I make from pig’s ears. I try to show the product as it is. I also do a Langoustine tartare with it, which I serve with passion fruit and coffee. And I use it in a fricassée with puy lentils, vegetables and scallops.

Duchess cold-pressed rapeseed oil www.duchessoil.co.uk

I don’t like olive oil – it’s too green and peppery for me – so this rapeseed oil, produced just down the road, is a great substitute.

It’s wonderfully light and nutty, not overpowering. It makes a good finishing oil, and I love using it in a vinaigrette.

The London Honey Co honey www.thelondonhoneycompany.co.uk

This company is run by Steve Benbow, who started producing honey from a hive on the roof of his flat near Tower Bridge in London 14 years ago. As well as selling honey from his own hives, he now also sells honeys from other parts of the UK and he sells honeycomb, too. I first came across the honey in Planet Organic and the flavour was phenomenal. I use it in my honey parfait with pear, pear jelly and hazelnut.

S Orefrigerant R B A - F R Epads EZE Sorba-Freeze Ltd, Unit 5, Girdleness Trading Estate, Girdleness Road, Aberdeen AB1 8DG, Scotland Tel 01224 894417 Email info@sorbafreeze.com www.sorbafreeze.com

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10 – 1pm, Monday 22 June, Hall 2, Yorkshire Event Centre The workshop costs £50 (+VAT) and will end promptly at 1pm to allow time to visit the show

CRACKING CHRISTMAS Back for a fourth year, this popular workshop takes place again at the Harrogate Fine Food Show in June. Getting your sales right in December can save your year. Come and learn how you can crack Christmas trading from two retailers who have over 25 successful festive seasons between them.

Then spend January on the beach.

What will you learn

What a 2% increase in margin can do to your profitability How to extend your Christmas sales into November l How you can play the cash flow game to your advantage l How to create a business plan specifically for this time of year l How to make sure your food shop is top of your customers Christmas list l How to manage wastage and stock season-specific products l l

To book your place call Jilly Sitch on 01757 825200 or email jilly.sitch@gff.co.uk Due to limited space, places for this workshop are confirmed on a first come first served basis only

www.gff.co.uk |

@guildoffinefood | #harrogateffs Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

47

G N RI ER SP FF O

Buy any 5 cases and get one of our gold star GREAT TASTE Award winning products free And Free Delivery too until May 31st!

Trial the delicious flavours we offer

We have been producing award winning pies since 1996 and in that time we have won over 17 pie awards and our pie maker, Michael, was named Epping Forest Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2014 following the success of our Steak & Stilton pie in 2013 where it was named as one of the country’s Top 50 products by The Guild of Fine Food further to its 3 star Great Taste Award!

This year we launch our Vegetarian offering Country Vegetable and Stilton Pie!

Chicken & Ham Steak

PASSION FOR PURE TASTE

Indian Sauces

Simply create deliciously healthy dishes

Lamb & Sweet Potato

Chicken, Ham & Leek

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Quality & Excellence Call us today: 01992 813283 for a full list of our range Quoting Fine Food Digest Scan our QR code or visit us at:

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| www.realorganic.co.uk

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The taste of pure English mint revived for the 21st century

The Gourmet Rumelier

01489 885946

48

April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

For more about our award-winning Black Mitcham peppermint chocolates and tea: visit www.summerdownmint.com

shelf talk

Looking for suppliers accredited by the Guild of Fine Food?

Follow the logo

what’s new

Pasta pots

Apple pressé

www.kentskitchen.co.uk

KENT’S KITCHEN

BELVOIR FRUIT FARMS

Continuing with its founding principle of quick food for busy people, Kent’s Kitchen has created four just-add-water pasta pots that can be prepared in under seven minutes. Bolognese, porcini mushroom, cheese & chive and tomato & chilli all come in 65g pots (RRP £1.85) and clock in at less than 180 calories each.

www.belvoirfruitfarms.co.uk

The Leicestershire-based soft drinks maker has added to its line-up of pressés with an English Cox apple variety. The sparkling drink, a combination of Belvoir spring water and pressed juice, contains no added sugar or artificial additives and preservatives. The producer recommends serving it over ice for a drink that “conjures up English orchards awash with soft, frothy apple blossom but with the sharp sting of a bee”.

It comes in 75cl and 25cl bottles, with RRPs of £2.99 and £1.85 respectively.

Country ketchup

GRANNY’S SECRET www.grannyssecret.co.uk

The latest Serbian condiment to come to the UK under the Granny’s Secret brand is a country ketchup in mild and hot versions. The preservative-free sauce is made with tomatoes, peppers, onions, apples and various herbs but contains only small amounts of salt and sugar, which are significantly less than the UK’s favourite brand, Heinz.

Available in cases of 12x300ml, the sauce is also said to be good for topping pizzas.

Curry powder

AROMA SPICES www.aromaspices.com

After nearly three years of research and development across the globe, Alex Toft Nielsen of Aroma Spices has created what he says is one of the world’s most complex yellow curry

powders. The result of the Dane’s quest to create the best curry powder on the planet is CP44 (RRP £4.20), which contains 44 different spices, herbs, fruits and vegetables.

It is available in cases of 8x50g tins (£23.80) exclusively from Cotswold Fayre.

Italian nibbles LUPETTA

www.lupetta.co.uk

Range updates Italian regional food brand Lupetta has added three varieties of crumbly Taralli snacks from Puglia (extra virgin olive oil, potato & rosemary and garlic & chilli) to its assortment of products.

All three varieties come in 250g premium paper bags with an RRP of £2.49. It has also introduced almond Cantuccini, made in the Chianti wine region, in 250g boxes (£2.99) as well as Tuscan soft Amaretti in 200g boxes (£3.29). All are available through Cotswold Fayre.

BELINDA CLARK CONFECTIONERY

Retailers can buy them from distributors Suma, Tree of Life, The Health Store, Queenswood Natural Wholefoods, Greencity and CLF. Each 171g box (RRP £1.49) contains four pouches of six crackers each.

Baking oil

MR HUGH’S www.mrhughs.co.uk

The rapeseed oil producer’s latest range has been created specifically with health-conscious bakers in mind. The vanilla, lemon, coffee, hazelnut and orange baking oils all come in 500ml bottles (RRP £3.50) bearing the logo of disability charity Papworth Trust.

Mr Hugh’s has been a longstanding support of the charity and hopes that the branding will encourage consumers to join the charity’s Care For Cake fundraising appeal. All of the oils are high in Vitamin E and omega fatty acids and contain less saturated fat than olive oil or butter.

www.belindaclark.co.uk

The gourmet marshmallow producer has made additions to its range of flavours as well as adjustments to its recipes and trade prices. The handmade, all-natural range now comprises salted caramel, vanilla, passion fruit, coconut, raspberry and chocolate flavours as well as two new Belgian dark chocolatecovered marshmallows: salted caramel and vanilla. Not only has Belinda Clark lowered the trade prices to offer a 30-40% margin but its lighter recipe means customers get more mallows in each bag and a longer six-month shelf life.

Re-packed crackers NAIRN’S

www.nairns-oatcakes.com

Nairn’s has a new-look pack for its oat crackers to bring them in line with the rest of its range. The wheatfree, high fibre crackers are billed as a lighter alternative to Scotland’s famous oatcakes but the added sunflower seeds lend them a “burst of flavour and a satisfying crunch”.

Rebranded range TOM’S PIES

www.toms-pies.co.uk

The Devon pie-maker has launched a range of five flavours in Victorian circus-themed packaging designed by agency Ziggurat Brands. Chicken, ham hock & leek, lamb & chickpea with chorizo, steak & ale, chicken & wild mushroom and mushroom & spinach with white truffle oil have been launched on Ocado but will be available to the wider retail trade. Each 250g pie has an RRP of £3.49.

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

49

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10:45

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April 2015 · Vol.16 Issue 3

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01538 382020 sales@cottagedelight.co.uk www.cottagedelight.co.uk Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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shelf talk

The constant gardeners From 19th century fresh produce supplier to London’s greengrocers, through pick-your-own and low-cost retailing, Garsons has constantly reinvented itself to emerge as a premium, full-service farm shop – but always with fruit & veg at its core

Deli of the Month INTERVIEW BY MICK WHITWORTH

N

ot many independent stores have survived the past decade without rethinking at least some aspect of their business model.

And in this ‘adapt or die’ world, few have proved more change-friendly than Garsons, which has been cannily tweaking and re-tweaking its offer for a good 40 years.

The Surrey business has been rooted in fruit and vegetable farming since the late 19th century, when its founders, the Thompson family, would send produce from the farm near Esher to London’s Borough Market by horse and cart – a 24hour round trip – to service the greengrocery trade.

Cart horses were eventually replaced by a fleet of Bedford trucks.

But when supermarkets began rearing their ugly heads in the late 1960s, it spelled the end for many traditional produce shops. With their market drying up, Garsons’ owners began selling direct to the public from a farm building and developed a pick-your-own (PYO) business alongside it.

Today, the main Garsons outlet (there’s a smaller unit at Titchfield, Hants) occupies a 180-acre site that combines a garden centre and 3,000 sq ft farm shop with what is now the country’s biggest PYO operation.

It’s a true “leisure retail” business that sees half a million visitors in the summer months alone.

“The PYO is the jewel in the crown,” says Nigel Chandler, who joined as farm shop manager in 1995. “It’s very popular with young families and with people who like their home cooking and preserving and want to buy the ingredients more cheaply in bulk.

“We don’t do asparagus now, but we start in mid-May with strawberries and go right through to the end of October with pumpkins.

“But each part of the business has its season, and they complement each other. The Thompsons and the Richardsons, the two families who run it now, are really quite clever farmers.”

Chandler describes himself candidly as “another statistic of the

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Fletchers in Worcestershire. These are supermarkets”, after giving up on his used extensively around the shop – own high street grocers and taking even for the beers and wines – with a salaried job with Garsons. “There fresh bread also due to go into a are a lot of us around who decided bushel box display rack soon. to walk away from it,” he tells me, When I mention to Chandler over a mug of tea in Garson’s staff that many farm shops struggle with canteen. “A few have bucked the fruit & veg, the former high street trend, but they have had to diversify greengrocer pounces on it. “I’ll tell – not many greengrocers have survived just on fruit & veg.”

Most people don’t put a big A fifth of Garsons enough fruit & veg display out, farm shop’s annual and then it’s self-defeating. That’s sales of just over £3 million come from fruit one of the sad weaknesses of & vegetables, which is farm shops. roughly in proportion you why that is,” he says. “You with the space given to fresh produce always have to look at your core in-store. Even on the late winter business, your USP, and nearly all the Monday when I visit, it’s a handsome farm shops set up in the last eight to display, with clever merchandising 10 years have meat as their USP. ideas such as Jersey Royals sold “If they only knew it, they could alongside mayonnaise, chives do equally well with fruit & veg – and spring onions, with signage but they’ve got to get a specialist encouraging shoppers to “create in. Most of them don’t put a big a fantastic potato salad”. Most enough display out, and then it’s produce is sold in Garsons-branded self-defeating. That’s one of the sad wooden bushel boxes, supplied by

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weaknesses of farm shops.”

Moved to its current location, a former pack-house, in the 1980s, Garsons farm shop started on “a low-cost model”, says Chandler, but it has changed substantially since the mid-Noughties. “It was all help-yourself, self-service to begin with. But over the past seven or eight years, customers have begun wanting to talk to knowledgeable staff who can inform them about the product.”

Two key changes have been the introduction of serveovers for both the deli and butchery – the latter run as a concession by high-class Surrey butcher Bevan’s. “Their business here went from £200,000 four years ago, when it was all pre-packs, to £750,000 now we do serveover,” says Chandler.

“Our cheese counter is doing three times what it was. So when people ask me if it’s worth putting a serveover in, I usually say they’ll see a 3:1 or 4:1 improvement. It’s a big investment, but it’s worth it –

products, promotions & people

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provided you have the footfall.”

Total staffing for the farm shop – excluding the butchery – is in the “early 30s” including part-timers, and the full-service deli is now the most labour intensive section, with eight or nine people working there over seven days. They are dedicated to the deli section – prepping, cheese-cutting and serving, or ordering for the deli in the backoffice – rather than swapping between the deli and till work, giving them a chance to really learn about their products. Chandler sends deli staff on the Guild of Fine Food’s cheese training courses and says: “It’s a good motivator to let staff have time out of their daily routine for training courses or supplier visits.”

Some cheeses are still sold as prepacks for grab-and-go customers, but the majority of these are also available loose for cutting on the deli counter. Dorset’s Leopard Dairy Products supplies 60% of the shop’s cheese, with some coming from Harvey & Brockless (formerly Cheese

Cellar) and a few local producers supplying direct. Logistically, Chandler says he prefers to work through wholesalers. “If we went to 20 suppliers,” he says, “time-andmotion-wise it wouldn’t work”.

The cheese selection, well displayed with informative price tickets, includes a mix of specialist and regional cheeses – Monty’s cheddar, St Luc Brie de Meaux, Sussex Yeoman – and those accessible mid-market staples of any farm shop, like Snowdonia’s waxed Black Bomber and Red Storm. It’s not as high-end as a Neal’s Yard, admits Chandler, but he is clear on his direction of travel. “To be honest, I’d like us to be a bit more artisan. There are so many cheeses on the counter that wouldn’t be a connoisseur’s choice, but they sell so well.”

He adds: “Because we started so long ago, I think we created bad habits in our customers!”

His personal favourites include Shropshire Blue and Laverstoke Park’s buffalo blue, and Garsons also carries

Laverstoke’s buffalo cheddar, which some customers choose for dietary reasons. We’ve have one lady whose daughter has an intolerance to cows’ milk. She comes in and buys half a wheel at a time, at £30 a kilo.”

Two or three cheeses are put on the counter for tasting each day, and there’s whole wheel of Parmesan on display “to create a wow factor”.

“It’s a 24-month cheese, so a whole wheel is £750-£800,” says Chandler, “but we’ll probably get through 10 of those in a year.”

Other stand-out sections of the store include a large selection of US ambient brands (the proximity to Richmond’s American University means there’s a large ex-pat population in the area) and a loose olive bar featuring 20-25 varieties from Olives Et Al and The Fresh Olive Co. This can take up to £2,000 a week in the summer.

While Chandler looks to mark-up most chilled items by 65-70%, he looks for “three times cost” on olives because they need a lot of attention.

“There’s a lot of work in maintaining an olive bar, so you don’t need to be giving them away. We sell them at £2.29/100g, and we do £75,000 a year on olives.”

A display of biltong and jerky sits alongside the olives, again from Jody Scheckter’s Laverstoke Park. “Jerky has really taken off,” says Chandler.

“I got the idea from Selfridges, who’ve got a whole counter for it.

“It doesn’t need a huge amount of refrigeration, and we can sell it loose. We get a certain amount of shrinkage [theft] but that’s factored into the price.”

Laverstoke has a butcher’s shop in Twickenham, seven miles from Esher, which means there is good brand recognition among locals – an important factor for Chandler.

“I’m quite an advocate of having a percentage of known brands in the shop,” he says. “We like to say we’re selling ‘fine foods from the farm’, but we’re not purists. We have such a lot of people shopping here that we have to have that complexity of range – but we don’t have cheap brands. It’s all medium or high-end.”

The most prominent example (bearing in mind FFD visited a couple of months before Easter) is a long island unit dedicated to Lindt chocolates. Garsons was, at one point, one of Lindt’s top 10 independent outlets in the UK. Now the brand is in every supermarket, but not with such a wide range, ▼

Nigel Chandler (left) ran his own greengrocery business before joining Garsons in 1995. Fresh produce still accounts for a fifth of the shop’s £3m-plus annual sales.

Vol.16 Issue 3 · April 2015

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shelf talk

Care goes into visual display throughout the store, with Chandler drawing inspiration from Whole Foods Market when it comes to cross-merchandising – like this grouping (left) of ingredients for a potato salad using Jersey Royals

and it still delivers huge sales for Garsons each year. “A lot of people wouldn’t sell it,” says Chandler, “but we do £50,000 of Lindt during the year. I wouldn’t get that volume with a Charbonnel et Walker.”

Chandler’s approach is pragmatic and businesslike. He is clearly used to sharing his thoughts on pricing and margins, and reckons he has visited well over 200 farm shops during his career, many of them as part of the tours organised for the annual FARMA farm retail conference.

“You can always steal ideas from other farm shops,” he tells me.

“People do it all the time.”

He is a regular visitor to Whole Foods Market’s Richmond store, and draws inspiration from the US chain’s approach to marketing and display.

“They’re so on-curve with trends like coconut milk, and their link-selling and cross-merchandising are second to none.

“I noticed they were merchandising dried mushrooms in packs alongside fresh, and now

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at this year’s FARMA conference.

“You never put a product out at £2.03. It’s either £1.99 or £2.29. You have to do some averaging, because products don’t come into us on a level playing field, price-wise, but we would generally average in our favour. We will price at £1.99, £2.29, £2.49, £2,79 and £2.99. Then from £4.99 upwards we would just do We don’t want to compete in the £4.49 or £4.99 prepared veg market, but we are – and then you losing out. No-one buys spring greens see how far you and chops them up any more. can push it. If something has come in at £10.20, you’ve got to go a compliment, really.” £9.99 or you won’t sell it.”

Other independents could This seems to be working. usefully learn from Garsons’ Garsons budgets for a 40% intelligent approach to pricing, gross margin overall, with each designed to maximise profitability department varying, but is currently while minimizing confusion for the running nearer to 42%. “That’s shopper. about waste management, really – “Price-pointing is very important,” and very sensible price-pointing,” says Chandler. “We do prices ending says Chandler, adding Garsons’s RMS in 9s, not 5s, and definitely no zeros. retail management IT system been And that’s how you really sweat your essential in this. “If you are making margins – that was a big buzzword we’re doing exactly the same. And they put some really interesting stuff on their price tickets, like a story about where clementines comes from, at Christmas.

“But then, Whole Foods copied us with their beer display. They came in here and took pictures, and now they’re using bushel boxes. So that’s

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sure your cost prices are correct as the stock comes in, you won’t fall behind with your shelf prices. If you’re running a small deli and you’re paperwork is piling up, you’re not keeping on top of your costings.”

The one worrying issue for Garsons – echoing the Viewpoint piece from Paul Castle of Farrington’s on p8 of this issue – is that sales of ambient goods are dropping away.

“That’s the hardest nut to crack at the moment,” says Chandler. “I talk to other people in the same kind of mature farm shops – because you have to compare like with like – and we’re all finding dry goods sales are falling. Deli and bakery have been the growth categories.”

For example, Garsons’ jam sales are down year-on-year, and Chandler is blunt about the reason. “It’s a traditional product, old people are dying and young people don’t want to buy jam.” To keep the category moving, he has homed in on smaller 113g jars from The Wooden Spoon and is offering them at £1.49 each or four for £5. “Multi-buys do work,” he says.

“So we’re trying to keep refreshing our dry goods, changing the lines around. But maybe longterm we’ll rethink the space and put more fresh lines in.”

Perhaps just as significantly for Garsons, changing consumer lifestyles are starting to dent its core category too. “We don’t sell as much fruit & veg as we used to,” Chandler reveals. “People only use real ingredients at the weekends now. In the week they buy takeaways and ready-meals, and then use readyprepared veg. No-one buys spring greens and chops them up any more.

“We don’t have the footfall to do prepared veg – you have to sell it within 24-36 hours – and we don’t want to compete in that market. But we are losing out.”

But he sees plenty of room for optimism. For example, as supermarkets strip less profitable lines from their shelves, leaving only the top two or three sellers from each brand, it leaves scope for specialist stores to fill in the gaps.

“I speak to distributors that supply the multiples and they are all narrowing their ranges – even Waitrose. So if you take the Brianna dressings we buy from Bespoke, Waitrose might have three of them, but we’ve got six or seven.

“And on a positive note, we’re told that people have got larger pay increases going through, and their fuel costs are reducing. Leisure retailing is going to take some of their extra spend.”

And with the multiples pulling further away from the premium food market, he adds, that’s exactly where Garsons needs to stay. www.garsons.co.uk

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April 2015 路 Vol.16 Issue 3