The hunt is on for the maker of England’s best steak pie’

Foodservice project manager Hugh Judd said: "The accolade of producing England's best steak pie will be highly sought after and as one of the nation's favourite foods it's not hard to see why. A truly well made pie with quality ingredients deserves to be recognised, whether it's served in a pub or restaurant or bought from an independent butcher or retailer. So if you think you make England's best, put it to the test in our competition." There are two categories: Independent (caterer or retail butcher) – for businesses making and selling pies from scratch on the premises; Manufacturer – making pies for supply to foodservice operators or multiple retailers. Steak pies can be made from beef, veal, lamb or mutton, but the meat used must be from an assured source compliant with the Red Tractor, EBLEX Quality Standard or an equivalent named quality scheme. In the first round of judging entries will be assessed and marks equating to gold, silver and bronze status will be awarded to the highest scoring pies. But only those achieving gold will make it to the final. Gold winners will be invited to resubmit their products for a further round of judging, and a winning pie will be chosen in each category. The entrant whose pie achieves the highest score will be awarded the winner's title, 'England's Best Steak Pie,' which will be formally announced at the Meat Management Awards on June 8. Ben Burgers, which won the manufacturing category in last year's competition to find England's best burger, encourages businesses to take part in the pie competition. Director Daniel Baker said: "We were over the moon with winning our award for our burger and it has proved invaluable to our business. We received some really good media exposure, which helped put our business into the limelight both locally and with the trade. "Most importantly though the competition helped to increase sales of the Ben Burger and drive awareness of the other burger products we offer. It's just a shame we don't manufacture pies, otherwise we would be entering this competition too." • The closing date for the competition is April 15 2011. Entry forms are available to download from www.eblextrade.co.uk now and there is no limit to the number of entries that can be made, however a fee of £15 will be charged for each pie entered.