Small but perfectly formed - 4Food meets the best of Britain's local producers. Daniel Etherington meets the woman bringing the best of the Orkneys to the nation’s dinner plates
Orkney Rose was set up by Rose Grimond to bring the best of the Orkneys to the great British public helping farmers in the northerly isles sell everything from oysters to haggis. But Rose hasn’t always been a helping hand to Scottish farmers. Before 2007, Rose was ‘getting ex-offenders into employment... trying to reduce the re-offending rate in London, so getting into the food industry was a slight change in direction.
Rose has strong family connections on the islands and spent many happy childhood holidays there so her passion for Orkney produce is nothing new. And in 2007 it prompted her to found a company dedicated to supporting Orkney’s producers by providing a vital link to the wealthy London market.
"I recognised there was a real need for companies like these to be started," she says. "There's so much demand in places like London to eat food with provenance, from local producers who are very passionately creative. And there's a real need for those suppliers to get their stuff to the big markets. What's lacking really is infrastructure for small to medium-sized companies."
The biggest challenge to the Orkney producers trying to access wealthier markets is the freight factor. "It's much easier and cheaper to fly to New York, than to fly to Orkney," says Rose. "It's even easier to get stuff back and forth from Europe than it is from the top of our own country. So no one would bother doing it independently,” explains Rose. “If you're a cheese-maker and someone wanted a beautiful cheese, and your cheese cost £5 and £17 to send it, they'd have to be a pretty die-hard, rich, cheese-fan to go ahead and make that kind of purchase."
Rose set up the company to plug what she sees as a gaping hole in the way the industry operates. “The food industry is all down to scale – it's either massive and multinational, or you're selling jam out of your car boot," she says.
Fare game... the Orkneys
Orkney Rose sells direct to restaurants, like Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck, as well as to the public, at London's Borough Market. Among the seasonal produce on offer is North Ronaldsay Hogget – meat from the sheep of Orkney's most northerly island, where flocks have been grazing on seaweed since Neolithic times.
"Incredible flavour," says Rose. "Really, really different, so different from lamb, you'd never guess they were from the same species. But not completely muttony, more tender because it's really lean, as they're utterly wild."
The island is also host to an array of weird and wonderful seafood, thanks to its position between the Atlantic and the North Sea. “There’s very rough treacherous seas,” explains Rose, “but you also get very clean seas from the big tidal shifts." Orkney Rose has relationships with an array of producers including fishermen, smokers, scallopers and, perhaps surprisingly to many Brits, sea-urchin gatherers, depending on season.
Rose's young business, is evolving all the time, trying to perfect its role as a mediator between Orkney's producers and punters. Ultimately, the concept could catch on and prompt others to develop infrastructures that help support and preserve Britain's regional produce. Providing a much needed link between the big and the small of Britain’s food industry.
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