Each year, around this time, the heart of international gastronomy beats in London, at the international culinary competition “Great Taste Awards” which awards the best and the highest quality products in the world, while being a reference point for gourmet food and has been characterized as the “Oscars of Taste”.

The awards with the 1, 2 and 3 gold stars at the Great Taste Awards are equivalent to the Michelin stars of awarded restaurants (“Great taste award, is to specialty food and drink what Michelin is to fine dining”).

The internationally famed taste competition “Great taste Awards” is organized by the “Guild of Fine Food’ since 1994, and is the world’s largest, longest standing and most respected food accreditation scheme for artisan and specialty food and drink producers.

The “Great Taste Awards” are internationally renowned for their objectivity and validity, since they relate exclusively to the product’s taste, without reference to the packaging, brand or logo, while it does not judge the marketing, but only the taste and quality of the product.

Indicative of the recognition of the awards is that the establishment is supported by the “Mecca” of gastronomy, Harrods of London as well as the well-known department store Fortnum & Mason, along with other well-known food department stores and large food companies worldwide.

This year, more than 500 expert panel tasters, which consisted of expert food critics, chefs, restaurant owners, producers, cookbook authors, and many culinary journalists, rated the products through the blind tasting procedure, in which they tasted, consulted and re-tasted, in order to decide which products are worthy to be awarded.

For 90 working days, from March until the end of July, the incredible amount of 14,205 high quality  products were tasted with the blind tasting procedure, from 110 countries worldwide, in order to present the awards, gold stars, which offer every product awarded international recognition.

The incredibly high rate of difficulty for a product to be awarded in this competition was confirmed in 2022, since only 241 products were awarded with the highest award of 3 gold stars from the total of 14,205 products which participated in the competition, representing a rate of 1.70%. As always, a rate of less than 10% of the participating products was awarded with 2 gold stars, which also constitutes a very high distinction.

Sakellaropoulos Organic Farms, who have been awarded in the past with a total of 33 gold stars in the competition, participated one more time with their innovative olive products, and were honored with 4 very high but also unique Gold Star awards, thus completing the unique number of 37 Great Taste Awards in total. In detail, the 2022 awards are:

Portokalenies Gourmet Olives – 3 Gold Stars

Portokalenies gourmet olives received excellent comments from the tasters, acquired the highest possible distinction of 3 Gold Stars, are part of the Great Taste Awards Supreme Champions 2022 while at the same time they receive a candidacy for the finals at the Golden Fork Awards 2022.

Excerpt of the final comments from the panel tasters for Portokalenies:

« Heavenly. We were transported straight to Greece by these joyous plump Kalamata olives. The marinade perfectly frames their tart yet fragrant character, with just the right combination of a good oil, a hint of orange and a handful of herbs.»

Telies Gourmet Olives – 2 Gold Stars

Excerpt of the final comments from the panel tasters for Telies:

« A bite into one of these marinated olives gives a mouthful of flavour, with a fullness but no bitterness. The addition of oil and herbs gives a Greek character which is distinctive. Juicy, grassy and earthy all at once illustrating a skill in curing and balance of salt. One olive has a really long taste which is very pleasing! »

Agouroelies Gourmet Olives – 1 Gold Star

Excerpt of the final comments from the panel tasters for Agouroelies:

« These tiny ovals pack a lovely citrus punch with a savoury note. The skin breaks easily in the mouth and the flesh is firm. The marinade is nice balance of acidity and oiliness. We found these very ‘moreish‘.»

Lemonenies Gourmet Olives – 1 Gold Star

Excerpt of the final comments from the panel tasters for Lemonenies:

« These Kalamata olives had a sharp lemon-peel aroma and we liked the freshness of lemon flavour and acidity along with that from the olive, which hummed along with the dusty heat of herbs that we’d associate with Greece. They’re nicely cured and juicy, slightly meaty and with a firm flesh.»

The announcement of the results from this renowned competition, justifies the efforts of Sakellaropoulos Organic Farms to create unique taste combinations for their olive products, while it is now evident that they belong to the international elite of gourmet foods.

These four specific Gold Star awards at the Great Taste Awards in London, result in the unique record of 562 international awards for Sakellaropoulos Organic Farms, from renowned international competitions of high prestige worldwide, indicating an international record of awards for an olive and olive oil producer, who cultivates, produces and packages exclusively his own olive products (Single estate organic producer).

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