Archive News - 2008

More Award Winning Ducks from the Steele Family Farm August 2008
Silver Hill Foods has added another five feathers to its hat, scooping five awards at this year's Great Taste Awards.

The award winning products for Silver Hill Foods at the awards were Silver Hill Whole Oven Ready Duck; Silver Hill Duck Breasts; Silver Hill Confit of Duck Leg and Silver Hill Duck Sausages with Chilli and Ginger; all achieving a Great Taste Award with One Gold Star. The Silver Hill Duck Breasts with Black Pepper and Garlic Spice achieved a Great Taste Award with Two Gold Stars - the highest award among all the duck products featured.

It has been a record year for the Great Taste Awards with 2021 small food producers entering just under 4,800 foods for judging. In total, there were over 1150 gold awards, of which 847 achieved one star, 220 were awarded two stars, and 72 received the coveted three stars.

These awards were a great honour for Silver Hill Foods, who have already achieved an award for their Smoked Spice Duck Breasts at this year's IFEX exhibition in Belfast in April, as well as the Maple and Mustard marinated Duck Breasts, which achieved Silver at the British Frozen Food Federation awards in June.

Now in its 15th year, the Great Taste Awards from the Guild of Fine Food in the UK are the acknowledged benchmark for specialty food and drink. The Great Taste Awards are highly sought after throughout the speciality and artisan food circles in the UK and Ireland, giving the selected products precedence in the fine food world. These awards also re-affirm Silver Hill Foods commitment to quality and consistency, and recoginise the great taste of its unique breed of duck, developed over 46 years by the Steele family at their farm in Emyvale, Co. Monaghan.

Silver Hill Foods is Europe's only hand produced premium Duck Company.

Silver Hill Foods Wins British Frozen Food Federation Award June 2008
'Award Winning Ducks from the Steele Family Farm'
Silver Hill Foods, Europe's only hand produced premium quality Duck Company, has received yet another accolade for its awarding products at the British Frozen Food Federations 2008 awards, which were hosted on Thursday 12th June in the London Hilton Hotel, Park Lane.

The British Frozen Food Federation has announced that Silver Hill Foods has won a Silver Award in the Best New Main Course/Meal centre Product - Catering Sector for its Duck Breast Fillets with Maple and Mustard Marinade. This is the second year in a row that Silver Hill Foods has won an award at this high profile event and have improved on last year's bronze medal for their Confit of Duck Leg.

Silver Hill also won a Product of the show award at this year's IFEX Exhibition held in the Kings Hall Belfast in late April coming in Commended for their Smoked Spiced Duck Breasts.

To add to the excitement Gary Mc Dowell (Silver Hill's Research and Development Chef) was the only Irish Chef to be shortlisted for the Craft Guild of Chefs Awards held in the Royal Courts of Justice, The Strand London on June 16th. Gary was shortlisted to the final 3 for the development chef category and was up against strong competition industry wide. These awards would be considered the Oscars of The Chef World and are highly sought after.

Silver Hill Foods continues to work on their already premium product to deliver the best possible quality products to their customers. This year's accolades and short listing show their determination and success at what they do. The company which was established by Ronnie and Lyla Steele in 1962 has always strived to be the best in their field and under the management of their son Stuart Steele it continues to grow and develop.

Silver Hill Foods is Irelands only fully integrated family owned Duck Company. Based in Emyvale Co. Monaghan they do everything in their power to ensure the highest standards are achieved in duck production from breeding, hatching, growing right through to processing, cooking, feather and duvet production. Silver Hill has the environment very close to heart and is constantly looking into green energy and to be more self sustaining.

IFEX Exhibition 2008 May 2008
This month Silver Hill took to their stand again for the IFEX Exhibition in the Kings Hall Belfast. Visitors to the stand got the chance to meet the team Stuart, Helen, Marion, Orla, Fergal and Paul and they got to taste for themselves the quality hand produced and innovative, duck products cooked on stand, by development chef Gary Mc Dowell.

Silver Hill were honoured with a Product of the Show Award coming in commended for one of the newest products on the market 'Smoked Spice Duck Breast'. This was not only a big hit with the judges but also with the visitors to the stand.

Other products featured during the three day show were Maple and Mustard Marinated Duck Breasts, Black Pepper and Garlic Spice Duck Breasts, Boneless Chinese Roast Duck, Honey Roast Duck, Confit of Duck and Silver Hill's ever popular Ultimate Duck Sausages.

Silver Hill Foods also sponsored the junior and senior Duck competitions with 17 entries between them they were indeed a popular choice for today's enthusiastic chef. The winners and their dishes will be posted here soon.

Great British Menu
Earlier this month Noel Mc Meel battled it out for the Great British Menu. Where on the Wednesday night Noel endorsed Silver Hill Foods by using our Duck for his main course of: Silver Hill Duckling with Orchard Honey, Star Anise, Fennel and Chive Mash, Baby Courgettes. Ironically his opponent, Danny Millar was using Silver Hill Duck Fat so we got a double mention on the one show. Unfortunately for Noel he wasn't chosen but he did us proud!!!

Craft Guild of Chefs Awards
On the 1st of May our Development Chef Gary Mc Dowell was short listed for the Development Chef category in the annual Craft Guild of Chefs Awards. These awards recognise the best in various categories throughout the industry. The awards will be held in The Royal Courts of Justice, The Strand London, on the 16th of June. We look forward with anticipation to the awards which are tightly contested among the best in the industry.

Quality & Consistency April 2008 Silver Hill Foods duck is unique to the UK Foodservice market as it is bred, reared, processed and cooked from the Steele Family Farm based in Emyvale, County Monaghan, Ireland. “Controlling the duck from hatching to the customers plate this is what makes our duck range unique” says Stuart Steele Managing Director “Our company ethos is to produce our customers with the highest quality raw or cooked duck which we ensure through controlling each stage. The range of duck products we produce is extensive and diverse and we work closely with our customers to build mutually beneficial business”.

Some of the most popular cooked duck products includes Boneless Chinese Roast, Honey roasted Half duck, Confit leg & Whole Aromatic duck. More than 46 years of good husbandry and breeding experience has resulted in lower fat content and increased depth of breast whilst retaining its succulence and unique flavour. The companies quality and commitment to producing the finest duck was recently acknowledged by Irelands Bord Bia with its coveted Duck Quality Assurance scheme. Silver Hill duck was also selected after extensive research to feature in Heston Blumenthal's BBC2 series In Search of Perfection series.

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