First Taste of the West Product Awards announced

The annual Taste of the West Awards scheme has announced its first round of Gold, Silver and Commended Product Awards for 2020.

The judges, working independently in what has become the UK’s largest regional food and drink awards programme, were impressed by new products including Somerset’s Dr Gelato with their Bath Blue and Caramelized Fig Gelato and Cornwall’s TirimasUGO with their Tirimasu which both won Gold. Traditional West Country products such as beef, bacon, beer, cider, jam and chutney also picked up the top award. For example, Buxton Butchers based in Bristol with their Himalayan Salt Dry Aged Cote Du Boeuf, Somerset’s West Country Water Buffalo with their Buffalicious Water Buffalo Mozzarella, and Waterhouse Fayre in Devon with their Exmoor Pond Weed Chutney all won Gold. While Denhay Farms in Devon had another successful year with a string of Gold awards for their bacon.

So far, Taste of the West has awarded 168 Gold Awards, 89 Silver Awards and 59 Commended awards in this year’s programme with around 400 products still to be judged.

John Sheaves, chief executive of Taste of the West, commented: “This year we are particularly pleased that given the difficulties the sector has faced with the Covid-19 crisis, the level of innovation in product development has been higher than usual. Through our experience of running the UK’s largest regional food and drink awards programme, our aim is to raise the bar in terms of excellence. In this way, we know that we can offer a product to a discerning consumer market which has been thoroughly tested and evaluated. So far, and there is still some way to go yet, we have seen a very high standard in food products.”