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Sizzling success for Q Butchers in Sausage Week showcase

The best sausages in Britain were recognised and celebrated as part of British Sausage Week 2016 – and Q Guild Butchers figured prominently among this year`s finalists, all having initially picked up gold awards.

The standout performer was Blacker Hall Farm Shop in Wakefield, which received a coveted British Sausage Week Banger Award for the second year running in the Traditional Sausage category for their best in the north Yorkshire Pork Sausage, a gold award winner.

They also picked up two silver awards – one for Lincolnshire Sausage in the same category, another for the shop`s Piri Piri Sausage in the Innovative Pork Sausage category.

Blacker Hall Farm Shop was set up by John Garthwaite in 1999 on the family-run livestock farm. The business has grown and expanded over the last 17 years to include a café, gift house and on-site florist. Now at the helm are husband and wife Edward and Cheryl Garthwaite.

Business development manager Ruth Clark said: `We are so excited to have now won the award two years in a row. For this year`s entry we wanted to continue to stick to traditional flavour, but add a slight twist.`

Other Q Butchers were among the British Sausage Week 2016 Roll of Honour as Champion of Champions finalists and gold award winners.

Allan Bennett Butchers, based in Codsall, Wolverhampton, won through to the final in two categories with both its Beef and Horseradish Sausage and Lincolnshire Pork Sausage.

Charles Clewlow, from H Clewlow Butchers in Nantwich, Cheshire, was a finalist with the shop`s Chicken Lemon & Ginger Sausage, which was also crowned UK Speciality Sausage champion in the Q Guild`s 2016 BBQ Competition.

Another Champion of Champions finalist was Lincolnshire-based multiple Q Guild member Gary Simpson, of Simpsons Butchers, with, appropriately, Lincolnshire Sausage.

Brendan Anderton Butchers, from Longridge in the Ribble Valley, which joined the Q Guild earlier this year and also runs a thriving catering business, won through to the final in the Traditional Standard Pork Sausage section of the Foodservice Supplier Awards category with its Butcher`s Classic Catering Pork Sausages.

The glitterati of the sausage industry gathered at an awards ceremony held at London`s Smiths of Smithfield in celebration of the great British banger. Awards were presented by British Sausage Week ambassador Jonathan Benjamin `JB` Gill, best known for his success with the band JLS, who is now a farmer and current presenter of CBeebies Down on the Farm.

Many other Q Butchers also picked up Sausage Week silver and bronze awards. `Once again, our members `sizzled` with multiple successes in this high profile annual competition. Congratulations to them all,` said the Q Guild`s manager Gordon Newlands.