Press Room

01/02/2010

LEFTOVERS COMPETITION WINNER ANNOUNCED

Stockport Council is pleased to announce the winner of its competition to design a tasty recipe out of leftovers.

The winning dish, crispy chicken pasta bake made using leftovers, was created by Victoria Ord from Heaviley. The prize for winning the competition was £50.

The competition was organised by the Council's Community Recycling Team, as part of the Stockport Boost campaign, and aims to reduce the amount of food people waste. From 40 entries 5 recipes were short listed and cooked at an event at Stockport Market on Saturday 16th January. The public tasted the dishes and voted on their favourite.

The competition is part of the National Love Food Hate Waste campaign set up by WRAP to reduce the amount of food thrown away. Research carried out by WRAP shows that 8.3 million tonnes of food that could have been eaten, is thrown away in Britain every year. One of reasons so much is thrown away is that we cook too much food. Visit www.lovefoodhatewaste.com for recipes designed to use up leftovers.

Councillor Stuart Bodsworth, Executive Member for the Environment, said: "Congratulations to Victoria and to everyone else who showed off their cooking skills for this competition. Throwing away perfectly good food is a dreadful waste of money and very bad for the environment too. I hope this competition has inspired people to have another look at any leftovers they might have to see what they can come up with. Eating up leftovers need not be a chore."

The prize money for the competition has been donated by Solutions SK, Stockport Council's wholly owned company.

Nic Cox, Managing Director of Solutions SK said: "We were delighted to have been able to support this competition which highlights the importance of trying to reduce the huge amounts of leftover food thrown out every year. This will not only help us to reduce waste, but will also cut food costs and encourage people to try new recipes using food they already have at home."

To find out more about the Stockport Boost campaign visit www.stockport.gov.uk/stockportboost (free internet access is available at all Stockport libraries).

Pictured are (left to right) Nic Cox, Victoria Ord and Councillor Stuart Bodsworth.

Notes to Editors:
Ingredients for Crispy Chicken Bake are:
Pasta, over ripe tomatoes, spring onions, roast chicken pieces, bread, oregano, mixed herbs and oil.
Cooking instructions are:
. Pre heat oven to 200°c
. Heat small amount of oil in a frying pan
. Add Diced tomatoes, sliced spring onions, salt and pepper and herbs and gently fry for 5 mins
. Place cooked pasta in deep oven proof dish
. Add chicken to tomato mix and stir for a further 5 mins. Then add to pasta and stir well
. Lightly toast bread then grate and mix with mixed herbs
. Sprinkle on top of pasta.
. Place in oven for 20-25 minutes or until piping hot all the way through