Award-winning Croots Farm Shop is hosting a visit by the Sausage King as part of his nationwide quest to drop in on some of the UK’s finest sausage producers.
Stephen Plume, who runs a website dedicated to sausages, is one of the UK’s leading sausage experts and has been dubbed the Sausage King for his efforts to promote tasty British bangers.
A teacher by profession, Stephen has undertaken a pledge to visit all the high-quality butchers listed on his sausagefans.co.uk website – and Croots Farm Shop near Duffield in Derbyshire is the latest that he’ll be dropping in on.
“We were chuffed when the Sausage King added Croots Farm Shop to his directory of great sausage-makers, and even more delighted when we heard he wanted to visit us,” said Croots Farm Shop owner Steve Croot. “Stephen is an absolute authority on the best British bangers, and we are looking forward to showing him our range of sausages at Croots and letting him try some of them for himself.”
Croots Farm Shop, based at Farnah House Farm, Wirksworth Road, has won scores of awards for its home-produced sausages, including Great Taste Awards, which are the ‘oscars’ of the fine food industry. The farm shop is renowned for creating unusual and original flavours, as well as more traditional bangers. Croots’ butchers enjoy creating new sausages to mark occasions, such as the Olympics or the World Cup, with a percentage of sales going to charity.
The pork used in Croots sausages comes from Packington Free Range Pork, in Staffordshire, while the beef hails from R & M Heath (Richard & Margaret) at Hazelwood Hall Farm, Hazelwood, Derbyshire.
The Sausage King, who is based in East Anglia, will be visiting Croots Farm Shop from 11.15am on Thursday February 19th.
“The visits I’ve done so far have had a huge impact and hopefully helped to encourage people back to buying local,” said Stephen. “The sausage makers on sausagefans.co.uk are the finest from around the country as recommended for inclusion by readers of the website.
“So far I’ve been to destinations including Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and Cheshire, and I am very much looking forward to visiting Croots in Derbyshire, as I’ve heard excellent reports about the quality of the shop’s sausages.”
The shop employs three full-time butchers and two assistant part-time butchers, as part of a 28-strong workforce employed in the shop and the restaurant, Shires Eatery.
Launched in 2008, Croots Farm Shop is open daily from 9am to 5pm (Shires Eatery until 4.30pm). Croots runs Fresh Fish Thursdays between 10am and 4pm on Thursdays.
For more information visit www.croots.co.uk
