Booths has announced the finalists for its first Slow Food Recipe Competition which is designed to protect traditional Northern recipes from becoming extinct.
Nine amateur cooks from Lancashire, Cumbria and Yorkshire will serve up their best-loved family recipes in the final which will be held at the Northcote Restaurant at Ewood Park, Blackburn Rovers Football Club on Friday 11 February. Judges including the Times food critic Charles Campion, chef at Northcote Manor, Nigel Haworth Booths chairman Edwin Booth and Catherine Gazzoli, chief executive of Slow Food UK are looking for the dishes that best combine local flavours, memories and traditions.
The recipes they will sample include Old Peculiar Casserole in a Yorkshire Pudding from 76-year-old Peter Bentley from Leeds. There’s a Plum Jumbly Tart from Helen Tawn in Ilkley and from Patsy Haigh in Huddersfield comes Kath’s Special Cherry Cake. Lancashire entrants include Louise Baker’s Farmers Sausage Meat Hotpot from Blackpool and Alice Tighe’s Barley Lamb Broth from Lytham. Sixty-five-year-old Christine Harrison from Chorley is hoping her favourite Blackberry Cake will sweeten up the judges.And Sarah Stover from Fleetwood has made the final thanks to her Honey Tea Bread. From Ulverston in Cumbria comes Helen Morris’s Pepperpot Pie and Windermere’s Lisa Ashworth serves up Grandma Jennie’s Gingerbread.
The prize for the winning recipe is a family three-course meal prepared and cooked for eight people, plus £500. Two runners up prizes of £250 and £100 will also be given.
The best dishes will be featured on special recipe cards in stores and appear on the Booths website.
Booths marketing manager Sarah Burns says: “We're thrilled with the response we’ve had to this competition - people have delved deep into their family cookbooks to share some amazing recipes that combine family history, local tradition and local produce. “Many of the dishes are treasured culinary secrets that date back generations and have only been saved in people's memories. We want to champion these beloved family dishes and protect them for many more generations to come.”
Each of the contestants will bring in their own dish to the final for the judges to taste.
Each entry will be given 15 minutes for the finalist to talk about the history of the dish and then for the judges to taste it. Slow Food UK's Catherine Gazzoli says: “Many of these recipes don't exist in cookbooks – they come from great great grandmas or grandpas who have been cooking these dishes for years.
“Slow Food is all about families coming together around the dinner table to take time to talk, eat and enjoy life. These recipes encapsulate all that is good about Slow Food – delicious, local family dishes prepared with love.”
A total of 70 recipes were entered in the contest.
Many of the recipes originate from the 1930's and 1940's when ingredients were stretched to make them go further. They also use cheaper cuts of meat which are increasingly coming back into fashion. Slow Food UK and Booths announced a partnership in April this year which sees the two companies working together to promote the quality, provenance, seasonality and regionality of food.
This competition is one of the first of many initiatives the partnership has embarked on to encourage people to think about what they are eating and to take time to treasure family meals.