Hand crafted at home
Italian mama’s homemade chutney solves taste dilemma for Cheshire deli restaurant.
An Italian restaurateur and his wife who could not find suitable chutneys as an accompaniment for the cheese platters at their authentic eatery in Knutsford found the perfect solution – they decided to make their own.
Now Raffaele “Lello” Merolle from Naples and his Sardinian wife , Laura, are producing six different varieties of their “Lovely Made” chutney range that are winning taste accolades from customers and deli outlets across the North West..
“In Italy we have sauces and a type of marmalade to accompany cheeses such as taleggio and grana padano parmesan but not the kind of chutney that our English customers tend to have with their cheese,” said Lello, who runs the Via Via deli-cum-restaurant in Knutsford.
“We tried several different brands of chutney to serve to our customers with the popular cheese platters but generally Laura and I found that they tended to taste much too ‘manufactured’. They all seemed to be either too sweet or too spicy and this inevitably ruined the subtle taste of the cheese”.
So, after 10 years in the UK, Lello and Laura set about sourcing top quality ingredients from outlets around Cheshire and started producing their own unique range of chutneys from their home in Knutsford. More/
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“The response we had from friends and customers was really unbelievable and, apart from Via Via, the range is now also available from various outlets around the county,” said Lello
“We only use the finest of local Cheshire ingredients but the most important ingredient of all is passion. Laura makes the chutneys with the same care and passion as she cooks for our children at home – so it’s a genuine, homemade product.”
The Lovely Made range currently includes pear jam, aubergine chutney, red pepper chutney, red onion chutney, celery chutney and a butternut squash and amaretto liqueur chutney. – all of them made, bottled and labelled by Laura at home.
Why Lovely Made? It’s a “marriage” of the L for Laura and Raffaele’s nickname “Lello” and his family name, Merolle.
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