A Darlington pickle company scored the winning goal in a ‘World Cup of condiments’ to find the best accompaniment for a pork pie.
Calder’s Kitchen’s spiced Sillylilli – an Indian take on its traditional piccalilli – beat some of the biggest names in the world of condiments to take the title in the social media competition.
It was run by famous North Yorkshire pork pie maker Vale of Mowbray, which is based in Leeming Bar, to try and find the best accompaniment for the popular snack item.
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Calder’s Kitchen, which won a Great Taste award for the condiment in 2020, beat the likes of Heinz salad cream, Branston Pickle and HP brown sauce to take the title in the Twitter world cup.
The final was with another smaller producer Lou’s Original Hot Sauce.
Andrew Calder, who runs the company, said: “The first we heard of it was when we were tagged on social media. It was a mix of household names and smaller artisan products. It was great fun. We didn’t know about it until we were tagged in it but we got behind it and let our followers know.
“I think we thought if we could get out of the groups it would be great but by the time we got to the final, we really wanted to win it. We pulled out all the stops – there was a bit of Twitter wars going on.
“In the end, there was a whole army rooting for us.”
He added: “As a smaller brand it's nice to eat some of the big producers like Nando’s and Branston. It’s all having a bit of fun but the serious point is that people do like to support local.”
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On the back of it, he is planning to send off some products to the Vale of Mowbray and see if they can work on a future collaboration.
It was a busy week for the company, which also had the chance to pitch one of its products in a Dragon’s Den-style event at the Fine Food North Show in Harrogate to buyers' major stores including Selfridge’s Fenwick’s and Booths.
Mr Calder, who was just left his job at charity Humankind so he can work at the business full-time, added: “They all had a taste and loved it so it was a really good week for that product. We got quite a few sales on the back of it and we had really nice feedback from the retailers.”
The company, which is based at Cleveland Industrial Estate, was founded in 2015 by husband and wife team Andrew and Anne-Marie Calder.
The recipe for their original product is based on Andrew’s late granddad Charlie's recipe, which they discovered and started trying out on friends and family.
Anyone with enquiries can visit the company’s website, email info@calderskitchen.co.uk or call 01325 344833
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