{"id":101362,"date":"2025-10-26T03:31:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T03:31:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/101362\/"},"modified":"2025-10-26T03:31:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-26T03:31:08","slug":"te-kamo-butcher-omak-meats-wins-silver-at-national-sausage-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/101362\/","title":{"rendered":"Te Kamo butcher Omak Meats wins silver at National Sausage Competition"},"content":{"rendered":"

And, the team was \u201cpretty chuffed\u201d with the result, she said.<\/p>\n

\"OmakOmak Meat owners and directors Chris and Sharon Martin celebrate their silver medal product at the Dunninghams awards dinner. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe always knew we had a good product,\u201d Chapman said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe get a lot of feedback from our customers, but now we\u2019ve got the certification to prove it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Omak <\/a>operates from what Chapman described as a deceivingly small retail frontage on Te Kamo Rd.\u2019<\/p>\n

However, stretching out behind it is a large wholesale operation with 17 staff, supplying about 75% of the company\u2019s overall product <\/a>to Northland cafes, bars and restaurants (for which it has previously won Northland Hospitality awards).<\/p>\n

The pork sausage recipe was fine-tuned by one of the store\u2019s two owner\/co-directors Chris Martin before submission. He and his wife Sharon Martin have owned the business for more than 30 years.<\/p>\n

Entries to the annual Dunningham\u2019s competition were submitted frozen and anonymously repackaged to ensure impartiality. Each sausage was judged in its uncooked state by a technical judge, followed by an assessment by two aesthetic judges of the cooked product.<\/p>\n

Competition organisers said marks were awarded for visual appearance and technical composition but the most weight was put on taste, texture and aroma.<\/p>\n

Because of the high volume of entries a standardisation system was introduced this year to ensure fairness across multiple judging panels, the organisers said online.<\/p>\n

\"BehindBehind Omak’s deceivingly-small retail frontage in Te Kamo, lies a large wholesale operation employing 17 staff and supplying about 75% of the company’s overall product to cafes, bars and restaurants across Northland. <\/p>\n

Mystery shopping of category winners was used to determine the overall Supreme winner.<\/p>\n

Chapman said while Omak didn\u2019t take a top place this year, the silver award was a major achievement for its first time entering the competition.<\/p>\n

She believed other Northland entrants had included Mangawhai Meat Shop, Coopers Beach Butchery, and Webster Family Butchery, but Omak was the only one to medal.<\/p>\n

The gold in the pork category went to Hellers, and Westmere Butchery in Auckland took out the Supreme Award for its Beef, Parmesan and Truffle sausage \u2013 it\u2019s fourth Supreme award in the past decade.<\/p>\n

The People\u2019s Choice award went to P\u014dkeno Bacon for its Chicken Con Queso sausage.<\/p>\n

A full list of the medal-winning sausages is available here.<\/a><\/p>\n

Westmere Butchery owner Dave Rossiter\u2019s helpful tips for getting the best out of sausages this barbecue season are:<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t overcook them \u2013 cook on medium heat to avoid bursting the casing.Don\u2019t prick them \u2013 \u201cYou don\u2019t want to lose all the moisture from the sausages.\u201dUse a fry pan or grill \u2013 not the oven, which dries them out.Turn them occasionally \u2013 cook time is about 20 minutes.Use a little oil \u2013 but not too much.<\/p>\n

Rossiter said the key to a great sausage is balance: \u201cThe main thing is that the flavour of the meat comes through\u201d.<\/p>\n

Sarah Curtis is a news reporter for the Northern Advocate, focusing on a wide range of issues. She has nearly 20 years\u2019 experience in journalism, most of which she spent court reporting in Gisborne and on the East Coast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"And, the team was \u201cpretty chuffed\u201d with the result, she said. Omak Meat owners and directors Chris and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101363,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1975,74026,4596,26657,69454,16773,74025,37562,3556,111,43,139,69,74027,44408,69452,7457,19554,8690,6202,80],"class_list":["post-101362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-at","tag-butcher","tag-competition","tag-crafted","tag-dunninghams","tag-great","tag-kamo","tag-meats","tag-national","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-omak","tag-pork","tag-sausage","tag-silver","tag-taken","tag-te","tag-wins","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}