Top chefs from all over the country battled it out at the weekend to be crowned the

Winner of the Golden Pig award … and the titles for best individual dish and winning

team were scooped by chefs from Lancashire and Yorkshire. The BBQ competition

took place in London at Young’s Brewery pub The Leather Bottle, the two teams of 6

Chefs were led by Adam Smith from Devonshire Arms at Bolton Abbey, and

Michelin-starred Mark Poynton from Alimentum in Cambridge. 

 

The celebrity judges, which included Head Judge David Mulcahy, ex-rugby player Olly Kohn, and the singer Sophie Ellis-Bextor with her husband Richard Jones from The Feeling, tasted 12 signature dishes using different cuts of Dingley Dell Pork from Suffolk. 

 

Steve Smith from the Freemasons at Wiswell cooked the winning dish “Yakatori pig offal with pork scratchings and pickled mandarin”, and was declared Grand Pork Chef while Adam Smith’s team “The Long Pigs” were awarded The Golden Pig trophy. Andrew Nutter from Nutters in Rochdale, Eric Snaith from Titchwell Manor in Norfolk, John Feeney

from Griffith Laboratories and Simon Hulstone from The Elephant in

Torquay made up the Long Pigs team with Adam Smith and Steve Smith

 

The event was organised by Dingley Dell Pork and “A Passion to Inspire “ .

 

Suffolk farmer Mark Hayward and Murray Chapman from “A Passion to Inspire “have put on a number of “Dingley Dell Flying Visits” (pop-up pork dining experiences) with the

help of well-known chefs over the past 3 years. The aim being to celebrate the

journey of the pig from farm to fork, to raise money for charity and give students a

chance to work with top chefs.

 

 This is the first Flying Visit competition and teams had to cook their dishes on a barbecue. Catering students from Llandrillo College, Colchester Institute, East Kent, Farnborough, Milton Keynes and Leeds City College, and Cambridge College worked alongside the professional chefs.

 

In between pigging out diners were treated to a butchery demonstration from Essex

based Direct Meats highlighting the different cuts used in the dishes.

 

The afternoon raised money for The Wooden Spoon rugby charity and the Teenage

Cancer Trust. Teenage Cancer Trust was chosen because Emily Mackay, a student at

East Kent catering college, had been so inspirational while working on a previous

Flying Visit event whilst undergoing treatment for a rare form of cancer.

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More information at:

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https://www.thecaterer.com/products/chefs-battle-for-dingley-dell-bbq-prize