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May 28 2022
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Cheesy news for Little Creek Cheese

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Once a year Australia holds the Australian Dairy Products Competition, Cheese Factories far and wide around Australia enter with the hopes to take out one the most prestigious titles available in Australia for their cheeses.

Little Creek Cheese located in Wyong, on the Central Coast of NSW, was such a company and entered 12 of their amazing cheese for judging. The official results were issued this week and Little Creek Cheese picked up 3 Gold medals and 9 Silver medals. All cheeses that were entered won a Gold or Silver. To top it off They also picked up the ”Highest Scoring Flavoured Cheese” trophy award for their “Yoghurt Cheese Balls, Garlic and Thyme”

With Covid regulations shutting down competitions over the last couple of years, it’s a wonderful start for the family run Cheese Factory, located less than an hour out of Sydney. Russell Parsons, owner/cheesemaker, flew to Melbourne to receive the trophy at The Dairy Industry of Australia Association (DIAA) Awards of Excellence Gala Dinner. “I couldn’t be prouder of our team and our products than I am right now” stated Russell.

Sue Parsons, owner/cheesemaker said “We have been around now for over 11 years and have support from lots of our local businesses. These awards just reinforce that the Central Coast has amazing producers. To win a national award really is the icing on the cake.”

The Cheese Factory is open to the public and also supply their products to a range of retail outlets as well as cafes and restaurants.

Dec 17 2021
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Central Coast Food Alliance December News Letter

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Food and Beverages feature strongly in Draft Destination Management Plan available now for Public Comment

Central Coast Council has prepared the draft Central Coast Destination Management Plan 2022-2025, intended as a guiding document to ensure the long-term strength, success and sustainability of the Central Coast visitor economy.

The Central Coast Food Alliance provided input to the development of the plan, and we’re pleased to see ‘Food and Beverages’ called out as emerging strengths of the region and a future ‘hero’ tourism segment. The ‘Meet the Maker’ Trail initiative – which the Food Alliance is supporting through a project in collaboration with a number of our members – is highlighted in the Plan and is one of the ways we’re working to strengthen awareness of the high-quality food and beverages produced in our region and to build the Coast’s ‘Foodie’ brand.

Another major Central Coast Food Alliance project for 2022, the ‘Central Coast Industry Festival’ will tap into the Destination Management Plan’s focus on creating events to attract visitors.   Interested residents and businesses are encouraged to view the draft Plan and provide feedback

More info HERE

Submissions close: 22nd Dec 2021, 5.00PM

Become a Mentor or Mentee

CCFA can help support your professional and business development or explore ways to use your capability and experience to support others.

What’s in it for Mentees –

  • Exposure to new ideas and ways of thinking
  • Guidance on professional development and support to build capability
  • Increased visibility and connections within the industry network
  • Support to accelerate business problem solving

Benefits for Mentors –

  • Recognition as a subject matter expert and leader
  • Exposure to fresh perspectives, ideas and approaches
  • Development of personal leadership and coaching capabilities
  • Opportunity for self-reflection and personal satisfaction

Reach out to Alex or Frank learn more about becoming or finding a Mentor.

Missed our recent Webinar sessions? Catch up here

Central Coast Food Alliance Member Virtual Meet-up – November 3rd

Featured inspiring discussions with local entrepreneurs Olivia Duffin from Duff’s Ice cream and Mikkel Overgaard from Crickets & Co and also Central Coast Food Alliance – Steering Committee members Nadia O’Connell from FirescreekWinery and Mark Harry from Mars Food

Find the webinar recording HERE

We’re looking forward to more great networking and information sharing events in 2022.

Grant Opportunity – Energy Efficient Communities Program – Food and Beverage Manufacturing

The grant provides small/medium, food and beverage businesses up to $25,000 to improve energy efficiency practices and technologies and better manage energy consumption to reduce their power bills by;

  • replacing existing equipment with more energy efficient equipment
  • installing or replacing components to help existing systems run more efficiently
  • carrying out energy audits
  • monitoring and optimising energy use and emissions.
  • increasing knowledge of energy efficiency practices, and
  • positioning small and medium sized enterprises to adopt future technological advancement in energy consumption.

Example focus areas are;

  • energy audits and energy management
  • heating ventilation and air conditioning at the manufacturing facility
  • lighting
  • other motors, conveyors, blowers, fans, pumps, and fluid distribution systems
  • process automation and controls
  • waste management

 More Details, Eligibility Criteria and Application HERE

 Fund Opening date: 12th Jan 2022, 9:00 AM

Fund Closing date: 18th Feb 2022, 5:00 PM

 Don’t hesitate to reach to Alex or Frank for help with Applications.

Join or Renew your Central Coast Food Alliance Membership for 202

Your financial support enables the Food Alliance to continue to deliver benefits for local Food and Beverage producers and foster the continued growth of the sector in the region.

Find our updated Membership and Sponsorship options HERE

Spread the word to other local Food and Business businesses you think would benefit from joining our diverse, supportive and high-effective Food & Beverage network!

Follow the Central Coast Food Alliance on LinkedIn HERE to keep up-to-date with industry news, insights, events, etc.

 Don’t forget to tag @Central Coast Food Alliance in your LinkedIn posts, so we can share your Business or professional updates with the CCFA network.

Sep 15 2021
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Central Coast Food Alliance- Newsletter- September 2021

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Sanitarium Health Food Company & Mackillop Catholic College collaborate to inspire Year 11 Food Technology Students

As a first for the Central Coast RIEP and Catholic School Broken Bay Diocese, on 24th August a virtual Food Technology presentation was delivered as a co-curriculum project between Sanitarium Health Food Company and Mackillop Catholic College at Warnervale.

Miss Eliza Baird, Dietitian at Sanitarium Health Food Company, generously shared her time and knowledge with 19 home based students from the school’s Year 11 Food Technology class, exploring aspects of the science of nutrition and the different roles Dietitians can play within the food system.

Mackillop Catholic College, Food Technology teacher, Ms Kerrie Pearce, collaborated with Miss Baird to create content for the workshop with the aim of bringing the Food Technology curriculum to life and inspiring the students to continue their studies in Food Science. The students have been investigated the basic chemical structure, function and food sources for essential nutrients and Miss Baird was able to explain how nutrients do and don’t work together in the context of familiar products.

“I thought that was cool considering I consume one of their So Good milks on a daily basis, so learning the reasoning behind why they add in Calcium to the product was cool” said one of the Food Technology students.

The students also valued an insight into the ‘day in the life’ of a Dietitian and by discussing different types of roles and places Dietitians could work, students gained new knowledge around food industry career pathways.

The Regional Industry Education Partnerships program supports the Catholic Diocese Broken Bay Partnerships Program (led by Shana Kuziow and Kylie Bailey on the Central Coast) and collaboratively creates connections between industry and secondary schools to support students in planning their future career pathways. Businesses or Schools wanting to learn more about the program should visit the RIEP website HERE or contact Jillian Williams, Central Coast RIEP Officer at 0447 331 399 or jillian.williams4@det.nsw.edu.au

Mars Food has partnered with Foodbank in a program that will provide 600,000 meals to Australians in need this year

Berkeley Vale-based, Mars Food Australia will donate 175,000 bottles of DOLMIO, MASTERFOODS and KANTONG Sauces, which will be manufactured specifically for food relief organisation Foodbank and supplied each quarter.

Demand for food relief provided by Foodbank Australia increased by 47% last year, with three out of 10 Australians facing food insecurity.

Mars Food GM, Bill Heague said the company is committed to helping ease the country’s growing hunger crisis.

“Last year we delivered 265,700 meals to people in need, but the pandemic made food insecurity an even bigger issue in our society, and we knew we could do more”, said Mr Heague.

Family-owned Mars Food is committed to delivering 25 million meals to people in need worldwide by 2025. Here in Australia that means one million meals for Australians by the end of 2021. The new Foodbank partnership will deliver 60 per cent of this goal.

Read more about the initiative in Inside FMCG

Mars Food and Sanitarium Health Food Company are just two of many organisations – large and small – working to tackle food insecurity here on the Coast.

If you’re keen to make a difference, reach out to us at CCFA or contact Foodbank to explore ways you can help.

New Member Profiles

Crickets & Co

Mikkel Overgaard established his container-based insect farm at Bensville in 2020 and having already built momentum selling crickets to the Pet-trade, Mikkel now has plans to scale up and diversify into insects for human food.

https://justcrickets.com.au/

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Seaweedery

Fusing great flavour with sustainability principles, Seaweedery founder Natalie Kalinova is developing solutions to transform seafood processing waste into tasty, versatile and nutritious food products, including prawn oil and seaweed vinegar

https://seaweedery.com.au/

Home Ground

 

Based at Empire Bay, founders Deiniol and Dallas are passionate about the Coast and supporting local producers and artisan makers. They launched their range of gift boxes in August, which include high quality food and beverage products sourced ONLY from small and medium producers on the Central Coast.

https://www.homegroundcentralcoast.com.au/

Want to become a Mentor or Mente

CCFA can help support your professional and business development or explore ways to leverage your capability and experience to support others.

What’s in it for Mentees –

  • Exposure to new ideas and ways of thinking
  • Guidance on professional development and support to build capability
  • Increased visibility and connections within the industry network
  • Support to accelerate business problem solving

 

Benefits for Mentors –

  • Recognition as a subject matter expert and leader
  • Exposure to fresh perspectives, ideas and approaches
  • Development of personal leadership and coaching capabilities
  • Opportunity for self-reflection and personal satisfaction

Reach out to Alex or Frank learn more about becoming or finding a Mentor

Feb 25 2020
0

Cheesy smiles all round

By | Events, Manufacturing, News

Sydney Royal Cheese & Dairy results for 2020 are out. Central Coast’s very own cheese factory, Little Creek Cheese, gained 1 gold, 2 silver and 5 bronze awards, in what was a very competitive event.

A family owned and operated cheese factory has been winning awards every year for their handmade artisan cheeses. This year is no exception with 8 highly sought after awards out of 10 products entered.

Gold this year went to their club cheddar Cumin Seed, silver to Club Cheddar Peppercorn and Yoghurt Cheese Balls Garlic & Thyme ( Labna ). The other awards went to Club cheddar Fig & Walnut, Club Cheddar  Bacon, B.B.Q. Cheese ( Haloumi ), Marinated Goat Salad Cheese with Garlic & Dill ( Goat Fetta ) and Marinated Salad Cheese Aussie Bush.

“We are so proud of what we are producing right here at Wyong” stated Sue Parsons, cheesemaker and owner. Russell Parsons owner and cheesemaker said, “I still get amazed when locals visit us at our factory and say the didn’t know we are here.”,” We have been making award winning cheese less than hour from Sydney!”. Mr Parsons added “this is the way cheese should taste, we make it with passion and love”

The factory is open 10am to 4pm every day and has viewing windows to see where the magic happens. This year they have introduced bookable experiences to show off what they do.

Located within the Wyong Milk Factory, a must to visit.