TWO international food critics have helped select some of the local products to be sold in Fodder, the Yorkshire Agricultural Society’s new food shop and café.

The enterprise at the Great Yorkshire Showground in Harrogate aims to support the region’s farmers and producers when it opens in June.

Jay Rayner, food critic for the Observer, and Simon Majumdar this week helped Heather Parry, YAS deputy chief executive, to select some of the products for sale.

She has spent the past six months assembling the best producers but found the pies and ice cream categories particularly difficult to judge, so called in the professionals.

The judges were bowled over by a trio of pork pies that came from Voakes Pies, of nearby Whixley, Glaves Butchers, of Scarborough, and Michelin-starred chef Andrew Pern from the Star at Harome, near Helmsley.

And they were in raptures about Just Jenny’s Honey Comb Ice Cream, from Jenny Clarkson, 28, whose father and brother have 135 Holstein/Friesian dairy cows at Hazel Slack Farm, Barkisland, in Calderdale.

It is an area of rich pastureland suited for dairy cows, but in the past 15 years, the number of dairy farms has reduced from seven to two.

Her aim is to make commercial ice cream to help the farm survive. Fodder will play a pivotal role in those plans.

Mr Rayner said: “The killer combination of crunchy honey comb and the creamy velvety texture of proper ice cream was a real winner.

“I’m delighted to hear it comes from a local family farm using honey from a local beekeeper.

This is a great example of how food should be produced. It’s delicious.”