Dockside team smash it at Farm Shop & Deli Awards

THOSE people who are really excellent at something make that something look really simple. Which is why so many others attempt to copy them and those so many others often fail.

Delifonseca Dockside is one such outfit that has its imitators - making the running of a high end restaurant and food store look as easy as organic peasy.

Happily there are rewards for hard work and tenacity and Candice Fonseca’s dockside delicatessen has just been crowned the best food hall in the land in the prestigious national Farm Shop & Deli Awards. 

Not only has the Brunswick Quay retail operation - which houses the Liverpool branch of celebrated Edge & Son butchers - been named Food Hall of the Year but has also scooped the North West Regional Winner accolade overall in the annual competition.

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Off the shelf: Team Delifonseca once again riding to glory

Following a series of evaluation, deliberation, secret visits, mystery shops by a panel of top industry experts and more than 3,000 consumer votes, this year’s awards held at Farm Shop & Deli Show at NEC Birmingham comprised 13 category winners and nine regional winners, it says here. 

Ms Fonseca said: “To have not only been handed the title of ‘Food Hall of the Year’, but to also represent Liverpool’s thriving food and drink scene by becoming the ‘North West Regional Winner’ is a great achievement for the team."

The news comes as the docklands operation eyes expansion plans at the same address.

Growing popularity, especially at weekends, means staff are having to turn people away who come from far and wide to the rather bijou restaurant. Nobody likes that and now there is talk of the lease coming up on the rest of the building which was built to house a gigantic Harry Ramsdens in the early 1990s.

Read: Sunday Dinners: Delifonseca Dockside

Now in their fourth year, the Farm Shop & Deli Awards recognise the best specialist independent retailers in the UK to unearth the crème de la crème of fine-food retail establishments. The awards celebrate the highest levels of service, product knowledge, initiative, innovation and community involvement.