One way to the Street Food Awards

If you are interested in entering the London heat of the British Street Food awards, now is the time to get your act together and put your entry in.

As Kerb, organisers and the awards, say: street food in Britain used to be Mr Whippy – or a bloke with a rusty handcart outside the football ground offering you Bovril with your burger. Fortunately, street food has changed.

The British Street Food Awards were founded in 2009, and last year’s event adopted a European flavour. The festival of vans, trucks and trailers showcased the very best of street food from across the entire continent. Traders travelled from Stockholm, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels and Berlin to compete, but the winners were Katie and Kim from Bristol, whose warm cheese scones and stovies with oatcakes baked out of a converted horse box, saw them voted Best of the Best. The two are now selling their food from a premier pitch at Trinity Kitchen, the new retail development in Leeds.

They are not the only past winners to have secured a permanent outlet: 2012 winners Ginger’s Comfort Emporium were offered an indoor pitch by Manchester Airport! Other entrants have moved to permanent outlets or have started supplying the supermarkets.

Some 4,500 people came to last year’s final in London’s Dalston Yard to see the huge range of street food. This year promises even higher standards, with 2013 having brought an explosion of street food which saw markets popping up all over Britain.

Richard Johnson, the founder of the British Street Food Awards, sees 2013/2014 as a period of real growth. Johnson (who is a regular presenter of the Food Programme for BBC Radio 4, and writes a street food column for the Guardian) is even working with Leon and the government to put street food swagger into children’s school dinners. “It feels like the original idea of street food – to make good fun food accessible to everyone – is finally starting to turn into a reality.”

KERB presents:
British Street Food Awards 2014 – The London Heat
19th Jul 2014
Granary Square, King’s Cross
Kerb is on the hunt for traders who’ll do London proud.
If you’d like to take part, here’s how:
•get together your four best photos (stall, food, people);
•write a short paragraph about your business;
•put these together in an email and send to:
richard@britishstreetfood.co.uk.

ELN says:

It’s time one of our local curry champions won the crown for East London.

Copy your entry to us at news@eastlondonnews.co.uk and we’ll feature your entry in the coming months!