Dales Butchers were very proud to be awarded a place in the TOP 3 at the Golden Haggis Awards 2019 over the weekend. The Golden Haggis Awards took place at the Oban Winter Festival and are only trumped in importance by the biennial Scottish Haggis Championships. The annual Golden Haggis Awards are next most coveted award for Scotland’s National Dish.
Eighteen different specimens of haggis winged their way to the West Highland town on the last Sunday in November. Entrants from all over Scotland, as well as ours from England, included three Scottish champions and three former Golden Haggis Award winners. The judges in the event held at the Oban Distillery, were two local chefs – Campbell Cameron from Oban FM and Roy Stalker of the Waterfront Restaurant.
Given a very tough task to separate the cream of the field Roy praised the standard of the entries:- “Lots of different varieties, textures, looks – more than I could have imagined. All were very nice, very tasty and I am pleased with the ones that we picked for the final.”
Campbell added:- “Like whisky there is no such thing as a bad haggis, there are good haggis and there are better haggis. Every one of the manufacturers of the haggis that we have seen here can take pride. They all have a different flavour, a different texture, the top three selected were the exceptional ones but there was one very worthy winner.”
The 2019 Golden Haggis Award was won by haggis makers Minicks of St Andrews but our Dales Traditional Butchers entry came a very creditable runner up. We were obviously delighted with the recognition for the haggis and Mark commented…
“We are absolutely over the moon with the result at this competition and it gives us the confidence to sell our haggis with pride. We do get lots of regular customers for our haggis and haggis products but this result is just outstanding.”
Quite appropriately, 2019 has officially been named as the ‘Year of the Haggis’, a celebration of Scotland’s National Dish that’s been promoted by Robert Burns World Federation and Scottish Craft Butchers.
The crowning glory of a traditional Burns Supper, haggis may not rank very highly in the beauty stakes, but what it lacks in appearance it certainly makes it up for in taste!
At Dales Traditional Butchers, we have been supplying the finest quality, locally farmed meats to the people of Kirkby Lonsdale and the surrounding areas of Cumbria and the Yorkshire Dales for over 100 years.
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