IQFA day 2

Have just completed day 2 judging Christmas foods. There is a large range of fine food from budget to premium in offer this year. 

The venue again was the DIT. The campus was The School of Culinary Arts and Food Technology at the Dublin Institute of Technology. It is centrally located just off O'Connell Street on Cathal Brugha Street. It is literally right behind the famous Gresham Hotel. It started life in 1940 as a food teaching college and is an impressive building. It was extended around twenty years ago. It is at the forefront of all things food in Ireland.

http://www.dit.ie/culinaryartsandfoodtechnology/theschoolofculinaryartsandfoodtechnology/

The criteria we used to judge was:

Flavour

Appearance

Texture

Ingredients

Packaging

Aims in the mkt place

Vfm 

Innovative

Today we had 55 samples, so lots of flavours and tastes!! Not eating for a while now!!

Judging at the IQFA

Day one for me at the Irish Quality Food Awards, held at the Dublin Institute of Technology, Catha Bruga Road (behind

the Gresham Hotel).

I got the Aircoach from Belfast to O'Connell Street at 6.30 arriving at 08.45, ready for 9am start. The category was bread. I along with 8 other judges tried/sampled 50 varieties of bread. Never realised there were so many, totally carbed out!! There were four categories and we had to choose our top 3. These were then whittled down to winner and highly recommended. The winners to be announced at the IQFA Dinner at The Round Room, Mansion House on 16th September. 

Will be returning tomorrow. Meantime I'll have a nap on the bus. 

Ciao for now.