A Huddersfield fudge maker and cake-baking supremo is to open a shop in the town centre after winning a major accolade.

Robert Firth runs his shop Cake Castle on Westbourne Road in Marsh and last year started to make fudge under the brand name Huddersfudge.

The 36-year-old entered his vanilla-flavoured Huddersfudge into the Great Taste Awards run by the Guild of Fine Food and has just found out he’s been given a three-star rating for his fudge, the highest accolade the Guild gives.

There were 14,000 entries to the Guild this year across many categories yet only 250 have achieved a three-star rating.

Robert said: “I was thinking about setting up a specialist fudge, chocolate and cupcake shop in Huddersfield town centre and this award has now decided it for me so I’ll be going ahead.

“I wasn’t expecting to win, never mind get three stars as that was something on my bucket list for the future. But now it’s happened it means it’s the right time to expand.”

He plans to open the shop in the Imperial Arcade within the next two months.

 

 

If people can’t wait to buy his fudge in Huddersfield town centre it’s already on sale at Card Corner on Dundas Street which is owned by Robert’s mum, Paula McClory.

The Huddersfudge name leaves folk in no doubt where it comes from and ultimately Robert aims to sell it across Yorkshire and nationwide through speciality retailers such as farm shops.

Robert said: “I was in a fudge shop just before Christmas 2022 and bought a box which cost £17 which was a lot for what I got. I tried it and thought if I could make something half as a good then it would be a success.

“I spent ages trialling it and now believe it’s as good as, if not better than, the expensive fudge I bought.”

Robert sells his at £3.50 for 180g, undercutting all his rivals by some way.

And he’s perfected his flavours which now include rum and raisin, salted caramel, vanilla, chocolate, butterscotch and lemon meringue.

 

 

He said: “I make my fudge the traditional way with it all rolled out on a marble slab which helps with the cooling process.”

Robert won’t give everything away about how he makes it but one of his essential ingredients is the Holmfirth produced Longley Farm butter while another is evaporated milk.

Making the fudge is a three-hour process and involves cooking the ingredients, pouring it onto the marble slab, folding it so it looks a bit like a baguette and then slicing and cubing it.

 

 

Robert and partner Rebecca Clarke live in Cowcliffe with their two young children, five-year-old daughter Molly and two-year-old son, Bobby.

Robert also makes up to 10 novelty birthday cakes a week and his designs have a phenomenal reputation.

He won a gold medal for his frog-designed cupcakes at the Cake International show at the NEC in Birmingham and came second in a cake class for his shoes and handbag cake which he made in tribute to his friend, cake-maker Jennifer Lofthouse from Thirsk in North Yorkshire, who sadly died during the Covid pandemic. She was well-known for making shoe and handbag cakes.

 

 

Robert has had Cake Castle in Marsh for seven years and he also makes handmade novelty cakes and chocolate bars and sells absolutely anything you could think of to go on a birthday cake.

Cake Castle is open Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday and Robert’s Facebook site is https://www.facebook.com/cakecastlemarsh

Written by ANDY HIRST who runs his own Yorkshire freelance journalism agency AH! PR (https://ah-pr.com/) specialising in press releases, blogging, website content and copywriting. 

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