June Duddy, originally from Chatton, travelled down to St James' Park, Newcastle on Saturday to the open auditions for the north of England round of the 'Britain's Best Dish 2008' competition, run by ITV.

Originally planning to make Chatton Cheese Cushat Pie, June was unable to source woodpigeon at her local butcher in time for the audition, so altered the recipe to make it Chatton Cheese Quiche, an alteration that won a spot in a north east recipe book last year for June.

This was clearly no ordinary quiche however, and the three judges, Jilly Goolden, John Burton-Race and Ed Baines, all top food experts, were bowled over by the recipe and put June through to the next stage of the competition.

June told the Advertiser: "I was terrified to tell the truth when I went in and seen the famous judges and said 'oh dear' to myself, but they were brilliant."

"My husband Michael was in raptures because it was in St James' Park executive suite too — it's lovely in there!

"I found out straight away that I had won and it was brilliant, everyone was shaking my hand. My grandchildren are over the moon, everybody is."

"The recipe has been passed down through generations of my family for hundreds of years and I like to use all local materials in all my cooking.

"I told the judges that at the next round even the salad will be homegrown!

"The original recipe is with the old Chatton cheese, but I use Doddington's Berwick Edge, it's the next best thing to Chatton cheese.

"I believe you have to support your local economy and buy local food."

The judges, although clearly impressed with June's offering at Newcastle, were so intrigued by the original Chatton Cheese Cushat Pie recipe that they have told her that they want to see it at the next round, the studio competition stage, in London in June.