Unique triple smoked bacon from Buchanan in Northern Ireland

Specialist meat and poultry processor Buchanan's Foods in Northern Ireland has developed an innovative triple smoked bacon.

The farm business, which is based at Upperlands in county Derry, has a longstanding commitment to innovative meat products especially bacon, lamb and turkey.

The new bacon is a development of the company's introduction last year of a unique product smoked slowly over locally-sourced Irish bog peat, an innovation which attracted the interest of leading delis in Northern Ireland.

The latest bacon product is smoked slowly and individually over peat, hickory and oak wood chips in the small company's own smoker on the family farm. As well as supplying local delis and independent stores, the company also operates its own small farm shop.

Jonathan Buchanan, the founder and managing director of the business, which has won a strong of UK Great Taste Awards for its free-range turkey meat and existing bacon products, says: "We are a small food business committed to coming up with interesting new taste experiences for consumers.

"We appreciate that staying ahead in bacon processing, which is such a competitive marketplace in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, is only achieved by continually seeking to add value to our products.

"We've enjoyed considerable success with our unique peat smoked bacon certainly in terms of its taste profile. It made sense, therefore, to seek to build on this. There's certainly a market demand here for naturally smoked products especially bacon.

"We smoke bacon slowly over individual chips of peat, hickory and oak for a richer and deeper flavour. We've taste tested the bacon at farmers' markets in Northern Ireland and it has been positively received by shoppers," Mr Buchanan adds.

Buchanan's began its food journey by producing free-range turkeys for the Christmas season using its own bespoke feed. The company has also developed its own small Himalayan salt ageing chamber on the farm and has introduced its own distinctively flavoured dry-aged turkey breast.