Champion of Champions to provide grand finale at World Cheese Awards 2016

Champion of Champions

At 9.30am on Thursday 17 November, this year’s World Champion Cheese will line up alongside the 28 previous winners of the World Cheese Awards in the competition’s first ever Champion of Champions event. Held at the Kursaal Congress Centre in San Sebastián, as part of the inaugural International Cheese Festival, the crowning of the Champion of Champions will offer a unique spectacle to bring this year’s World Cheese Awards to a close, following a record-breaking 3,000 cheeses being judged the previous day.

The World Cheese Awards’ Super Jury of internationally recognised cheese experts will be invited back to judge this unparalleled field of world champions, as food professionals, cheese-makers, buyers, retailers and curd nerds gather to take in this landmark event.

John Farrand, managing director of the Guild of Fine Food, organisers of the World Cheese Awards, explains;

“With such a huge global gathering of cheese experts and aficionados heading to the Basque Country this year, we thought it would be the perfect time to stage a Champion of Champions event, pitching this year’s World Champion Cheese against the 28 other winners that have been crowned since it all began in 1988. This will be a special moment in the history of the World Cheese Awards and we’re looking forward to celebrating the heritage and diversity of the competition, as recent winners, such as Le Gruyère AOP Premier Cru from Switzerland and Bath Blue from the UK, line up against champions of old, ranging from Spanish Manchego and French Fourme d’Ambert, to the Canadian Le Cendrillon and Queso Arico Curado Pimentón from the Canary Islands.”

The World Cheese Awards will take place on Wednesday 16 November, during day one of the International Cheese Festival, which will be held at the Kursaal Congress Centre in San Sebastián from 16-18 November 2016. For more information, visit www.internationalcheesefestival.eus.

To request a press pass for the International Cheese Festival, please visit www.internationalcheesefestival.eus/en/prensa. 

More information on the World Cheese Awards and the Guild of Fine Food can be found at www.gff.co.uk/awards/world-cheese-awards.