The great and good of the food and drink world assembled last night at The Royal Exchange for the 2023 Fortnum & Mason Food and Drink Awards. And while the canapes and seemingly limitless Champagne were all rather fabulous we were mainly there to discover who the panel of judges had decided should walk away with a gong for their contributions, be it in writing, broadcasting or photography.
We spotted all manner of famous faces at last night’s ceremony which was presented by chefs Angela Hartnett and Andi Oliver, who corralled the boisterous crowd – Mary Berry, Rick Stein, Stanley Tucci and the Hairy Bikers were all there.
But to get to the heart of the matter, here’s who took home a prize.
- Food book – Red Sauce Brown Sauce: A British Breakfast Odyssey by Felicity Cloake
- Debut food book – Breadsong: How Baking Changed Our Lives by Kitty & Al Tait
- Cookery book – West Winds: Recipes, history and tales from Jamaica by Riaz Phillips
- Debut cookery book – Rambutan: Recipes from Sri Lanka by Cynthia Shanmugalingam
- Drink book – Holy Waters: Searching for the sacred in a glass by Tom Morton
- Debut drink book – Wild Brews by Jaega Wise
- Cookery writer – Fliss Freeborn for work on Student Cuisine for the Gloomy Teen
- Food writer – Bee Wilson for work in The Guardian and FT Weekend Magazine
- Drink writer – Will Hawkes for work in Pellicle Magazine
- Restaurant writer – Joanna Taylor for work in ES Magazine
- Programme – Searching for Italy presented by Stanley Tucci
- Audio – Blasstal, A podcast by Lecker
- Photographer – Kim Lightbody
- Fortnum’s special award – Cooking Simply and Well, for One or Many by Jeremy Lee
- Fortnum’s special award – Food for Life by Tim Spector
- Digital creator of the year – Giuseppe Federici (AKA @Sepps_eats)
- Personalities of the year – Si King and Dave Myers (AKA The Hairy Bikers)
