Northampton gourmet burger truck business awarded best vegan burger and third best chef in UK

A Northampton gourmet burger truck business has won the titles of best vegan burger and the third best chef in the UK at a recent national competition.

The Flavour Trailer, set up in April 2018 by partners Mario Shephard and Charley Cummings, competed against well-established restaurants and chefs at this year’s National Burger Awards.

The pair spent eight years honing their chef skills across Europe before setting up the business, which has aimed to “revolutionise the way people enjoy takeaways”.

Now, after competing against 15 other burger businesses in three challenges to acclaim the title of the UK’s best burger, they have achieved two national accolades.

Mario, who represented the team in the final, said: “It’s mental and really overwhelming to have national recognition.

“We just run burger trucks across the county and to be on the national stage was a wonderful, validating experience.”

Thousands of restaurants, establishments and businesses applied for the National Burger Awards and it was whittled down to just 16, who took part in the final last Wednesday (February 22).

Cooking in front of a live audience of a couple of hundred people, the chefs took part in three challenges – ‘signature’ to decide the best burger, ‘vegan’ to decide the best vegan burger, and ‘technical’ to decide the best burger chefs in the UK.

“It was an intense environment but I was very excited to cook,” said Mario. “I’ve cooked between 50,000 and 100,000 burgers in my time so the practice was done – but replicating what I know on a stage with a live audience was completely different.”

All of the rounds were blind tested and it was decided that The Flavour Trailer produced the best vegan burger in the UK – and Mario was named the third best burger chef nationally.

Though Mario put up a good fight producing their ‘classic flavour burger’ in the signature round, only first was awarded and he never found out where it placed in the final 16.

Mario said: “There were people competing who inspired us to start our business – we call them the OG burger Gods.

“Some of them have had 15 to 20 years in the industry and we are still young, so it was amazing to be among the creme de la creme of the burger world.”

The business, which has three trucks across the county, is not new to winning awards. They won gold in the ‘One to Watch’ category at last year’s Weetabix Northamptonshire Food and Drink Awards.

The Flavour Trailer team are “really proud of this achievement” and Mario says their national accolades are a result of a full team effort.

“We’ve already had a boost in sales and loads of new customers, which reaffirms where we’re at,” he said.

Team Flavour Trailer is also in the process of renovating their unit in Brixworth into a restaurant and seating area – and are hoping to launch it before the summer.

With a massive audience for the pop-up trucks, the business will remain a takeaway but they want to give customers the option to sit down and eat their food.

There will be more to come on this from Chronicle & Echo in due course.