The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - The Telegraph Magazine
Tasting notes
Award-winning British foodie buys
When David Jowett tots up the amount of cheese he makes every week to calculate a yearly average (12 tons), he’s slightly embarrassed .‘ it’ s tiny really, compared to other producers,’ he says. his operation might be smallscale, but the product, a washed-rind cow’s-milk cheese made by hand in an old-fashioned teak-clad Dutch vat, is punching above its weight. Last year, Rollright (imagine an oozy reblochon with a deeper flavour) was crowned Supreme Champion at the artisan Cheese awards, just eight months after Jowett put it on sale. it’s now in independent delis and cheese shops across the country (rollrightcheese.com).
in Glasgow, Stefan Spick nell and Deborah norton defied naysayers by turning six square metres of kitchen space into a bakery ‘that actually bakes everything on site’ – bucking the trend of many that fill their shelves with pastries and breads from delivery vans. Cotton rake’s production is proving efficient: straight from oven to shopfront, tarts, baguettes and astonishingly good croissants are snapped up without lingering in freezers (cottonrake.com).
a fellow innovator is Kylee newton, who has resurrected ‘artisan methods of yesteryear’ to make preserves, partly to ‘inject longevity’ into seasonal gluts. Far from being fusty, we’ re talking whisky-pick led carrots( good for brunch on sourdough) and gin-pickled cucumber (newtonandpott.co.uk).
these producers’ success in giving old ways a new life won them recognition at the 2016 YBFS, awards that celebrate‘ young British foodies’ doing great things in restaurants, on market stalls and in breweries/bakeries/butcher’s shops. to enter or nominate for this year’s competition, see the-ybfs.com.