OUR county has a plethora of wonderful, tasty treats and now, thanks to a new website, there is no excuse but to scrap the supermarket and buy local.
The new initiative, MINonlyne, means you can now find everything on your shopping list – bread to beer, chocolate to cheese, not to mention gin, honey, ice cream and many more delicious products and drinks – from one place, which can then be delivered to your door.
The website is the brainchild of Rachel Mallows MBE of The Mallows Company, who set up Made In Northamptonshire (MIN), the food and drink networking group which has been supporting and promoting the county’s producers since 2011.
This exciting project has been bubbling on the hob for some time but thanks to support from MIN member Kirsty Clarke from Waterloo Cottage Farm at Great Oxendon and the team behind the county’s tourism campaign Northamptonshire – Britain’s Best Surprise – Rachel is thrilled to see it finally come to fruition. She said: “The county has so many passionate and brilliant artisan producers and in recent years we’ve been really pleased to see so many local stores and farm shops start to stock their wares, but this new website is the only place where you can source only Northamptonshire produce in one place, so customers know that they are truly supporting local.
“We’re delighted that we have over 200 delicious products already listed, with more to be added, and proud that our door-to-door delivery service means we’re helping the environment by cutting all those individual car journeys, while our reusable delivery boxes means there won’t be a plastic bag in sight.”
The launch of MINonlyne was celebrated at the Rockingham International Horse Trials last month by offering visitors a choice of two Northamptonshire sandwiches – it being National Sandwich Week – designed by the Head Chef at Silverstone Circuit and the reigning Weetabix Local Food Hero of the Year in the Carlsberg UK Northamptonshire Food and Drink Awards, Dean Hoddle.
The first was his tribute to the traditional county dish, Ock ‘n’ Dough, using slow-cooked ham hock from Waterloo Cottage Farm, Brigstock Piccalilli – an old recipe from the north Northamptonshire village which has been brought back to life by Northampton’s Friar’s Farm – and pea shoots from the county’s only micro herb grower, MicroGreener, all wrapped in thick-sliced sourdough from Whittlebury Bakery in the south of the county.
His second, a mouth-watering offering for vegetarians, prompted the bakery to develop a ringed, multi-seed loaf and this time its filling comprised of Friar’s Farm’s Northampton Chutney and radish shoots, again from MicroGreener, both perfect accompaniments to the award-winning Northamptonshire Blue cheese from Hamm Tun Fine Foods at Hannington.
Despite being specifically created for the launch of MINonlyne, it is thanks to the support of Dean and the team at Silverstone that the sandwiches will now be included on the menu at the racing circuit for their remaining events of the year.
MINonlyne is now taking orders at www.madeinnorthamptonshire.org and while not all parts of the county are currently covered by the delivery service (usually priced at £7), special delivery can be arranged, as well as national delivery.
Meanwhile for those wanting to further support the initiative, it also has a membership scheme which will provide members with special producer offers, the chance to be the first to taste new products and invitations to exclusive food and drink events.
The MINonlyne platform was built by business text messaging provider TxtSync and it is thanks to their generosity – and that of all those involved in the project – that all profits from online sales will go back in to supporting members of the MIN co-operative.