Prue Leith awarded a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday honours

Industry luminary and Great British Menu judge Prue Leith has been honoured with a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday honours list.

Leith, who received an OBE in 1989 for her services to the industry, has pioneered British culinary standards for over four decades, having set up the Leith’s School of Food and Wine with Caroline Waldergrave in 1974 and chaired the School Food Trust since 2006.

Leith has also penned novels in recent years, but her appearances on the televised cooking competition The Great British Menu and her role as chair of the SFT has ensured that she has been instrumental in British hospitality.

“I can’t believe the CBE,” she told Caterersearch. “I’ve been a novelist for 15 years, but the honour is hardly for my contribution to romantic fiction! It’s years since I was a caterer, but I guess it is for my work as Chair of the School Food Trust which has done a terrific job in getting school lunches healthy, training cooks to cook fresh food simply and well, getting head teachers, governors and local authorities to take food and cooking seriously.

“From next year every secondary pupil will be able to spend a term cooking in the curriculum and we’ll have 5000 Let's Get Cooking clubs in schools.  The whole ethos around food has changed in the last few years, with the press, parents and the educators all accepting that getting children to like good fresh healthy food is vital. It's as important for the catering trade and the economy as it is for the NHS that we understand food – if our children love good food and cooking, they will not only be healthier, happier and live longer, but we’ll gradually have more jobs, more restaurants, more artisan producers, and more sustainable farming, and a better economy in this country too.” 

More hospitality winners in the Queen's Birthday honours >>

Prue Leith named as new chair of the School Food Trust >>

Chef Conference: Prue Leith urges industry to nurture staff >>

Craft Guild of Chefs honours John Campbell and Prue Leith >>

By Rosie Birkett

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