Good Taste Lincolnshire
Lincolnshire is an agricultural county, the second largest county in the country. One would expect quality producers.
Lincoln is the County Town. Odd then, a market town with no market. Odd then, a farmers market in the High Street with less than half a dozen stalls.
When wandering around it can be helpful to have a guide, though I prefer to go where my legs take me and discover not be led.
Good Taste Lincolnshire is a magazine which one assumes promotes the best the county has to offer. Only it does not.
It also hands out Taste of Excellence awards. Which only serves to emphasise what I have been saying for some time, so many awards that can get an award for almost anything these days, that the awards have become worthless, at best little more than marketing scams.
One of the worst examples of awards is the Great Taste Awards. A meaningless award, not to say that what it is stuck on is not quality, but no guarantee that it is.
Looking through the listings of Good Taste Lincolnshire, many many omissions that should be there, many many inclusions that should not be there.
Lincoln has three excellent coffee shops, Coffee Aroma, Madame Waffle and Makushi aka Base Camp on Steep Hill. Only one gets a listing, and yet several other coffee shops listed.
Redhill Farm Shop a quality butcher in Bailgate (they also have a stall on the Lincoln farmers market in the High Street) get a listing but not Andersons an excellent butcher in Heighington, one of the best in the country.
Elite fish restaurant, excellent fish n chips, again one of the best in the country, and yet no listing.
Many chains are listed. Utterly bizarre a promotional piece for Cosy Club, a chain, a fake 1930s bar so fake it is a Monty Python parody of fake.
White Hart serves excellent food and yes, deserves a mention.
On the other hand, The Cheese Society, the place for high quality cheese, with staff who know their cheese, not a mention. Though Cote Hill Cheese which they sell does get a mention.
Nor a mention of the excellent fishmonger in Lincoln Central Market.
Food and Drinks Awards are presented if not hosted by Taste of Excellence.
One of the sponsors Lincoln Tea and Coffee. One of the recipients of an award, for Tea or Coffee Shop of the Year, Coffee Bobbins, a mere coincidence is supplied by Lincoln Tea and Coffee. What beggars belief, Lincoln Tea and Coffee awarded Wholesaler of the Year. Oh, and just when you think it could not get any worse, Lincoln Tea and Coffee supplied the tea and coffee for the fifty quid a head award ceremony.
The coffee supplied to Coffee Bobbins, which according to the their website, Sweet Brazil Blend, is an exclusive blend for Bailgate Deli, which they describe as a speciality coffee shop. They claim to only supply the best quality products.
At The Lincoln Tea and Coffee Company, our philosophy has always been that we only supply the best quality products and service to our customers.
We supply a wide range of fabulous teas and coffees of the highest quality, as well as creating bespoke blends for that added wow factor! We make our coffee and tea just for our clients.
Our coffee is roasted and packaged to a very high standard.
We constantly receive comments on how fresh our coffee is when bags are opened. This places us at the top of our industry.
We were approached by Barry when he was at the initial stages of setting up a specialised coffee shop in spring 2016. After initial discussions and listening to his business plan, we quickly started to get a picture of Barry’s vision for the Bailgate Deli, a vegan and vegetarian café/deli in Lincoln’s Cathedral Quarter.
We worked together to come up with the right espresso coffee blend and range of fine leaf teas and discussed the coffee equipment and skills that would be needed. In one day of Barista training, Barry quickly picked up coffee making skills he could start to build on and he soon discovered he had a fine palate for tasting when a coffee was just right.
You could not make up this bullshit if you tried. The coffee supplied to Bailgate Deli and Coffee Bobbins, Sweet Brazil Blend, neither has exclusivity as claimed, is some of the worst coffee I have encountered, over roasted to the point of being burnt, broken beans. Coffee usually has a pleasant aroma, this coffee smells disgusting. Far from being quality freshly roasted coffee, the bags had no roast date, this is is low grade commodity coffee. They are not even coffee roasters, they buy in and bag. And no, they are not top of the industry, bottom of yes, top of no. One day of training does not a barista make (and if in any doubt visit Bailgate Deli and order a coffee, though I recommend not). Bailgate Deli is not a speciality coffee shop. No surprise then, the coffee served in Bailgate Deli and Coffee Bobbins undrinkable.
We have a host of bandwagons people jumping on, craft beer, coffee shops, coffee roasting and now gin.
