Showcase your best products to the world! The Baltic Taste Award food quality competition in Riga
On 7 September, Ķīpsala will be the venue of Riga Food 2023, the biggest food industry fair in the region, which will also include The Baltic Taste Award, a prestigious food competition taking place for the first time in the Baltics, with companies from Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia receiving objective assessments on their products, while consumers will get to find out which of them is the best and most delicious.
The purpose of the competition is to identify food products of outstanding quality, to highlight the best ones on an international scale, to promote the visibility and sales of these products and their manufacturers, and to increase their quality.
The Baltic Taste Award will be an opportunity for large and medium food manufacturers, farms, and artisanal producers in the Baltics to have their products blind-tasted by professionals and get not only objective opinions and assessments, but also comments and suggestions for improving these foods. The professional jury will consist of leading European chefs, bartenders, sommeliers, and food engineers,’ Svetlana Riškova, member of ‘Pavāru klubs’ and cooking competition organiser, pointed out. She emphasised that the competition would promote the visibility of foods made in the Baltic States, improve their quality, and build an expert connection between catering professionals and food manufacturers.
‘We are pleased with the chance to hold the Baltics’ first quality-focused competition of such a high level at Riga Food. Before, we mostly handled national competitions, but now it is time to present the excellent products our manufacturers have to offer to top European experts. The highest-scoring foods will also enjoy broad publicity,’ Aiga Kupre, manager of The Baltic Taste Award, said.
The medals won at The Baltic Taste Award will stand for high quality, making it possible for food service companies that trust the opinions of professionals to introduce excellent, high-quality foods into their menus. The competition will encourage better-quality food products to be used by food service companies. And for the consumer, the award-label on the products will make it easier to navigate the broad range of various foods and choose the best ones for everyday life and special occasions.
Foods in the following categories may be submitted for the competition, and will undergo assessment as part of it:
- bread and pastry products,
- milk and dairy products,
- meat and meat products,
- fish and fish products,
- honey,
- berry, fruit, and vegetable products,
- non-alcoholic beverages (including water, juices, coffee and tea),
- fermented beverages (beer, wine, fortified wines, cider),
- spirits,
- vegan foods.
Professional international jury The products submitted by the Baltic companies will be assessed by an international jury of chefs, beverage experts, and food engineers with extensive experience in judging competitions. Five jury members will evaluate the products in each category.
They will conduct a blind tasting behind closed doors, assessing the foods based on various criteria and providing a short written summary about their impressions of the flavour, as well as any necessary improvements, and possible applications of the product. The jury’s opinion will be of great help in the further development and improvement of the product.
Before and during the competition, the members of the jury will not have any access to information about the product or the manufacturer, and will not be shown the packaging of the product, eliminating the possibility of lobbying, and ensuring impartiality. Once the evaluation is over, all the products submitted for the competition will be on display as part of a separate exhibition at Riga Food 2023.
Announcement of winners; publicity for products The winners will be announced at Riga Food 2023, on 9 September 2023. The best foods will get gold, silver, and bronze The Baltic Taste Award medals. The visual design of the medals may be used on the product packaging for marketing purposes to showcase the high quality of the product. To help the winners build international visibility, there will be a marketing campaign organised after the competition covering websites in all three Baltic States. The highest-scoring products will also be exhibited at a media event for journalists, influencers, chefs, and manufactures to see and taste them. The event will create even more publicity and visibility!
Apply and present your product to the world! We invite Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian food producers to submit their best and tastiest foods to take part in the new and prestigious The Baltic Taste Award food quality competition by 15 August. The entry fee per product is EUR 90 before 23 June and EUR 130, from 24 June to 15 August. Fill in the
registration form. Application formdownload The Baltic Taste Award food quality competition rulesdownload Competition scoring table The competition is organised by ‘Pavāru klubs’, the BT 1 international exhibition company, the Institute of Agricultural Resources and Economics, in conjunction with the Ministry of Agriculture.
