North Yorkshire farm diversification business reaches final of national food excellence award

A North Yorkshire real dairy ice cream manufacturer is celebrating after being short-listed in a national food excellence competition within weeks of winning the Farmers Guardian Best Farm Entrepreneur award.

Acaster Malbis based Yorvale one of only four food businesses to reach the final of the Food Manufacture Excellence Award for the best Small Business of the Year.

The awards honour the very best food and drink manufacturing companie and Yorvale reached the final by impressing the judges across a range of criteria including category and supply chain management, new product development; health, safety and environmental management and marketing.

Yorvale is competing against London based Alara Wholefoods, Devon based hand fried crisps manufacturer Burts and last year’s winner, Mash Direct from Northern Ireland.

Yorvale’s owners Ian and Lesley Buxton now have to wait until an awards dinner at London’s Marriott Grosvenor Square Hotel on 11th November to find out whether they will add another prestigious national award to their burgeoning trophy cabinet. Lesley Buxton

is looking forward to the event; "We’ve had a fabulous 20th anniversary year. To be short-listed for a national farming award is amazing, but to win that and be short-listed for a national food excellence award is unbelievable."