Brewery is pure gold for food festival

 

A CHAMPION brewery is raising a glass to celebrate the ‘Taste of Cheshire’ with the launch of brand new bottled brew.

 

The Coach House Brewing Company, based at Warrington, will unveil the bottled version of its popular Cheshire Gold beer to mark the opening of the Vale Royal Food and Garden Festival, on Saturday and Sunday, October 18 and 19.

 

The free event, held at The Hollies Farm Shop, at Little Budworth, will be a showcase of the region’s finest produce, from delicious meats, pates and cheese to tasty beers and wines.

 

The Coach House Brewing Company is amongst Cheshire’s finest beer makers, having taken home countless awards for their prize winning brews over the past 17 years.

 

The cask version of Cheshire Gold has been a regular at free houses across the county for the past 18 months, with bosses at the brewery seeing the festival at The Hollies as the ideal chance to launch the bottled brand.

 

The Coach House Brewing Company sales nmanager Greg Bolton said: “As a brewery which prides itself on its Cheshire heritage we are delighted to be able to team up with The Hollies Farm Shop for what will be an amazing celebration of the finest local produce.

 

“We have worked hard to create a beer that we think captures the very best the county has to offer, so we could think of no better location than The Hollies to give the bottled version of Cheshire Gold its first outing.”

 

Nicknamed the ‘Harrods Food Hall of the North’, The Hollies Farm Shop is famed for offering the finest delicacies and local produce, having landed the Visit Chester and Cheshire’s Best Food Retailer award for the past three years.

 

The shop is organising the Food and Garden Festival along with Vale Royal Borough Council.

 

Director of The Hollies Ed Cowap said: “We are proud to welcome The Coach House Brewing Company to the Food and Garden Festival.

 

“The brewery has an incredible reputation across Cheshire for producing fantastic beers and ales. It is tremendous to have a brewery like The Coach House Brewing Company on our doorsteps, and we look forward to them showing off Cheshire Gold.”

 

Cheshire Gold will be The Coach House Brewing Company’s second ever bottled beer, and will be sold at The Hollies Farm Shops in Little Budworth and Lower Stretton following the festival.

 

The brewery has developed strong ties with The Hollies over the past year, with the shops being the first to stock their last bottled brew Blueberry Classic Bitter, which has proved to be a popular tipple amongst customers.

 

For more information visit www.theholliesfarmshop.co.uk

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The Hollies Pumpkins are being harvested

Richard, Cyril and Mick have been in the field since this morning cutting the pumpkins ready to be loaded onto the trailers to bring back to the farm shops.  The Hollies Little Budworth will have a pumpkin paradise by the end of next week, which is Cyril’s forte, having created the spooktaculars of the last few years at The Hollies.

Tomorrow, thousands of gourds will be cut in our fields and will be on display in the shops by the end of the week.  The gourd and pumpkin seeds were sown in May and have proved to be far more successful than the little green pumpkin I have grown from seed in a pot!

Don’t forget that there is a pumpkin carving competition at the Vale Royal Food and Garden Festival on Sunday 19th October.  If you haven’t grown your own then  you can buy a home-grown pumpkin from The Hollies.

If you get the chance go to our Pumpkin Club group on Facebook, a guy from the States has uploaded his pumpkin harvest pictures - they are huge pumpkins!  http://www.new.facebook.com/group.php?gid=8848232555

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Cheshire Life’s Cheshire Food Heroes 2008/2009

Cheshire Food Heroes 2008/2009

The judges who visited The Hollies Farm Shop unanimously agreed that we are a worthy winner of the Cheshire Life award for Cheshire Food Heroes.

We are delighted to win such a fantastic award and can’t wait to the awards ceremony in October.  We were judged anonmiously; therefore, yet again the accolade can be attributed to the great team we have working with us, thank you.

Watch out for the picutres in December’s issue of Cheshire Life!

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ITV1 films Chris Bisson at The Hollies Farm Shop

Actor hand-picks farm shop’s fresh food for TV series

 

CELEBRATED actor Chris Bisson called into the foodies’ heart of Cheshire to stock up on fresh produce to cook for a new TV series.

 

Chris, who is best known for his role as Vikram Desai in Coronation Street, and appearances in Shameless and East is East, headed straight for The Hollies Farm Shop at Little Budworth to stock up on high quality fresh produce for his recipes.

 

Filming for ITV’s celebrity version of Britain’s Best Dish, Chris chose to visit The Hollies for ingredients to go into recipes for his take on a traditional Sunday roast and Macaroni pie.

 

Whilst being filmed choosing some locally-grown beetroot and carrots and Italian pasta for his dishes, Chris explained why he had chosen The Hollies.

 

“The Hollies is all about local produce, which makes a massive difference when you’re cooking. The carrots still have dirt on so you know they are straight from the ground, and the produce here is all from high quality suppliers.

 

“It’s important if you can shop using local producers and suppliers then you do it. The quality is much better and there are not loads of food miles involved so you’re not paying as much,” he said.

 

Following his shopping trip to The Hollies, and a Good Morning Cheshire smoothie at the farm shop’s Ice Cream and Smoothie Bar, Chris was off to film cooking the dishes at his Lymm home.

 

For more information visit www.theholliesfarmshop.co.uk

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Bite back at the credit crunch

 

Home Grown Marrows at The Hollies Farm Shop

Here at our Cheshire farm shop, we are encouraging customers to tuck into home-grown produce to bite back at the credit crunch.

The Hollies Farm Shop at Little Budworth is giving away home-grown marrows to customers in a bid to encourage them to try local grown produce and get the taste for supporting local producers.

Despite supermarkets’ claims to have slashed prices, buying locally sourced produce is being voiced as the way to watch the pennies by local retailers at The Hollies.

Richard Cowap, whose family has sold home-grown produce at The Hollies since 1959 and sons Ed and Phil now run the food lover’s heaven, has nurtured the succulent marrows on his farm and is hoping once people taste them, they will be inspired to buy local produce.

Customers can also pick up mouth watering marrow recipes in the shop.

Director of The Hollies Ed Cowap said: “By buying locally grown produce you know it has not flown across the world.  When it comes to fresh produce and dairy products we are beating supermarkets on price as you don’t have to foot the food miles.”

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Where in the world is The Hollies Black Bag?

When a crazy idea hits the table, its usually picked up and tried out by us or the team.  On this occasion we’re asking our customers, colleagues, friends and family to get involved in this one! 

Where in the world can you get yourself photographed with your Hollies Black shopping Bag?  This black bag is for life, not just for Christmas. 

From Cheshire, the black bag has so far been captured in Scotland, Italy, France, Honduras and now India.  Frank, a longstanding customer, has sent us awesome photos of his business trip to India with The Hollies Black Bag.

The Hollies Black Bag arrives in Delhi

Where in the world will the next Hollies Black Bag be captured?  Its over to you….

Visit www.theholliesfarmshop.com for more details or email your photos to mail@theholliesfarmshop.com

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Cheshire Food Heroes

The Hollies Little Budworth has been nominated as Cheshire Life’s Cheshire Food Heroes in the Cheshire Life Food and Drink Awards 2008. We find out in mid September if we have won, in the meantime we’re really pleased to become a finalist.

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