North Yorkshire Council’s Katherine Breckon has won a major accolade in the hospitality industry after creating pioneering recipes that improved meals for thousands of pupils across North Yorkshire.
Training and Development Officer Katherine won the Public Sector Chef Award category at the Craft Guild of Chefs Awards 2024, seen as the chefs’ Oscars recognising the “exceptional talent” across the whole of the industry.
Nominations for the Public Sector Chef Award were sought from the high-volume catering arena including hospitals, prisons, education, military, public and social services and in house staff restaurants.
Katherine said winning the award was “brilliant” and added: “I wasn’t anticipating this win at all, and finding out I was shortlisted was an honour in itself and one I was extremely proud of.
“To attend the 30th celebration of the Craft Guild of Chefs surrounded by such esteemed chefs was a surreal experience, to say the least. To actually win such a highly acclaimed award is a huge privilege.
“The number of people from celebrity chefs to industry colleagues who came over to say congratulations to me is totally overwhelming. It certainly has not sunk in that I have won a ‘Cheffing Oscar’.”
Katherine is no stranger to winning awards for her expert cooking skills. Earlier this year she won Chef of the Year 2024 at the Public Sector Catering Awards.
The mum-of-two is a key member of NYES Catering, providing meals to more than half of North Yorkshire’s schools and developing meals and menus in-line with food trends and food standards, always looking at opportunities to create tasty meals, while reducing food waste and recipe costs.
Katherine joined our catering service 15 years ago having previously worked as a school cook at West Cliff Primary in Whitby.
corporate director of resources, Gary Fielding, said: “Katherine’s passion for the providing healthy and nutritious meals for our schoolchildren in North Yorkshire goes above and beyond her role and I’m really pleased that she has been recognised at this prestigious, top level.”
