Industry Awards
Butchers Shop of the Year Award Winners Luke Middlemiss - Young Butcher of the Year 2022
National Craft Butchers are delighted that three of its members achieved recognition in William Reed’s 2022 Butchers Shop of the Year Awards. Congratulations go to Johnson’s of Thirsk who won North of England Butchers Shop of the Year and to The Gourmet Butcher, who took home both New Butchery Business of the Year and Welsh Butchers Shop of the Year. Both have featured in previous issues of Craft Butcher. So, it seems only right that we now turn our attention to the third winning NCB member – Luke Middlemiss, of Geo Middlemiss & Son, Otley, now proud holder of the title ‘Young Butcher of the Year 2022.’
Nineteen-year-old Luke is not one for letting the grass grow under his feet. Not only is he already a qualified butcher, having achieved his Level 2 Butcher Standard Apprenticeship and enrolled on the Advanced Butcher apprenticeship, but he’s also a fully licensed, WATOK certified slaughterer. Oh, and he also runs the family farm. He says he ‘wants to make an impression’ and within five minutes of talking to him, this young award winner has done just that.
Luke is the sixth generation Middlemiss to become a butcher. The roots of the business stretch back to 1881 when Walter John Middlemiss first set up a stall on the lane outside the farm, before moving to a butchers stall on Otley market. Farming, Luke says, is in his blood. Before starting his ten-hour shift at the family butchers shop he tends to 30 Limousin cross cattle, 65 ewes and ‘dozens’ of chickens and geese on the farm where his uncle lives. The farm supplies much of the shop’s meat, with the rest being sourced at market from other local suppliers.
Having a strong connection to farming and a deep understanding of livestock, is key to being a good butcher, Luke feels. For him though he also credits his eighteen months working for John Penny and Sons Abattoir with helping him become the butcher he is today. As with butchery he says he ‘started at the bottom and worked my way up’ and as a result can genuinely say he has ‘farm to fork’ experience and a respect for the animals we get our meat from.
Being a family business Luke is supported and encouraged by his grandfather, father, and uncle, all of whom he works with on a daily basis. In fact it was Peter Middlemiss, Luke’s father, who nominated Luke for the Young Butcher of the Year award. As part of the judging process, Bill Jermey, Chairman of the Institute of Meat, visited the shop to see Luke in action. Fast forward a couple of
10
months and Luke was on stage at the NEC in Birmingham, receiving his award.
It’s fair to say that Luke is at his happiest when in the shop. Serving customers, many of whom have bought meat from the shop for generations, is his favourite part of the job. He jokingly says that despite his long hours the only pressure he really feels is ‘being able to uphold a good level of banter’ with the regulars! He’s ambivalent towards entering further competitions himself, though says he likes to enter products into competitions. This is something which as a business they’ve achieved success at fairly recently with their ‘Pork Dripping’ which won an award in the Deliciously Yorkshire competition. With an experienced baker as well as butchers within the business Luke says their pork pies (made
to an age-old recipe) are the best in the land – though laughingly admits that many butchers would claim this.
Having achieved so much at such a young age what’s next for this talented young butcher?
Perhaps unsurprisingly Luke’s ambitions are about making the family business bigger and better – perhaps opening another shop. He’s equally passionate about running an abattoir, being all too aware of the shortage of small abattoirs throughout the country. Thinking even further ahead he says that the thought of any future children of his own becoming 7th generation Geo Middlemiss butchers,
‘Would be just the best thing ever.’
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