Lake District Hotels Ltd Chef Gets First Taste Of Fine Food Award Judging

June 30, 2011 (Press-News.org) Fraser Soutar, Head Chef at the Inn on the Lake had first hand opportunity to test some of Cumbria's finest ingredients when he was invited to be Chef for the Cumbria leg of the Food North West Fine Food Awards. Known for his love of local ingredients, Fraser saw it as an opportunity to unearth some new local flavours.

As part of his duties, Fraser had to cook the raw ingredients for the tasting panel to sample. It included black puddings, venison, beef and sausages. It was also an opportunity to try the jams, pickle and cheeses that were also entered for the awards.

This is the first time Fraser has acted as chef for the day and he received excellent feedback from the Food North West team who said the whole preparation process was very smooth. "We were really lucky to have Fraser cook for us at the Fine Food Awards Cumbria heat. Producers who enter trust us to take care of their products and present them to the judges in their best possible light, with Fraser in the kitchen we were certainly able to do that."

Fraser earmarked his favourites quite early on in the day and enjoyed what he described as "a very special black pudding" and some very interesting sausages. Summing up his day as chef he said "Here in Cumbria we are privileged to have wonderful, locally reared produce on hand all year round - this competition only goes to highlight the wide variety on offer. I have certainly tasted some very unusual products and some that I am already following up on to include on the menu at Inn on the Lake.

With over 400 products entered, I was pleased to see some Cumbrian favourites winning awards - the Pork & Mr Vikki's Chilli Jam Sausage from Dales Butchers was excellent - as was the venison loin steak from Deer n Dexter, I am glad to see they both won recognition."

Anyone interested in finding out what local ingredients are used on the menu at Inn on the Lake can visit http://www.lakedistricthotels.net