cumbria's sticky toffee pudding champion...

Sticky Toffee Pudding is probably the most widely travelled of all the Cumbrian specialties; as far away as the US it is considered the quintessential British pudding. The most prominent producer is the Cartmel Village Shop, whose excellent pudding is sold at independent fine food shops throughout the country as well as in places like Selfridges, Harvey Nichols and Fortnum & Mason. There are a couple of versions of the story about where this classic originated, but it seems that head chef Francis Coulson developed and served the dessert at Sharrow Bay Country House Hotel in 1960, although Cartmel Village Shop also claims to have invented it. Their version contains pure cane sugar, sticky dates, free range eggs, fresh local cream and butter and other goodies. Sticky Toffee Pudding should be eaten warm with cream or ice cream.

To settle the debate about whose pudding is the best, North West Fine Foods organised a competition at the recent Cumbrian food lovers festival. Five hand picked judges had the wonderful task of tasting and selecting who makes the very best "icky sticky toffee pudding". They included chef and professional pudding maker Paul Taylor, local celebrity chef Nick Martin as well as three invited judges: Mindy Connelly from Florida and two younger judges from Blackpool, Michael Sharples and Martha Shepherd. Each judge independently marked each pudding in five individual areas, the scores were totted up, and the final winner declared. Up walked the beautifully face painted, ice cream toting five and a half year old, Imogen Barber, Cumbria's very first Sticky Toffee Pudding Champion. A worthy winner, who calmly told the gathered audience her secrets for success, mainly involving a really sticky sauce.

Content and photography supplied by www.Artisan-Food.com, funded by Distinctly Cumbrian.