Food and drink producers across Wales are being urged to go for gold again in this year's Great Taste Awards. With the closing date of April 25 fast approaching, producers need to get their skates on if Wales is to improve on the record 50 gold awards that the nation achieved last year.

Full details of how to enter the awards, organised by the Guild of Fine Food, together with category listings can be found on the website www.finefoodworld.co.uk or contact 01963 824464.

Producers will be keen to follow in the footsteps of Mike Carnell, Hay on Wye's Chef on the Run, who won the best Welsh speciality award last year with his grapefruit and ginger marmalade, which was a three-star gold winner.

Injuring his leg in a charity parachute jump forced a change of career direction for chef Mike, who established Chef on the Run at The Old Stables Tea Rooms in Hay-on-Wye in 2006.

Together with his wife Rachel and daughter Katie, he serves freshly made cakes and desserts in the tearooms and has about a dozen different home-made flavoured preserves for sale.

"People have their favourites, but I always knew that the Grapefruit and Ginger Marmalade was something special," said Mike. " I was chuffed to get the three-star gold from the Great Taste Awards. Our customers have always loved it, so you get an inkling of what's got a chance of winning."

Chef on the Run was one of a trio of three-star gold award winners from Wales. The others were Mild Horseradish Cream made by Marion Jones of Welsh Lady Preserves, Bryn, Y Ffor near Pwllheli and Smoked Gressingham Duck Breasts by Jonathan Carthew, Black Mountains Smokery Ltd, Crickhowell. Wales also had 15 two star golds and 32 one star golds.

A total of 548 British foods earned a one star gold, 70 were awarded two-star gold and just 38 won the coveted three-star gold.

Many of the gold award winning Welsh producers received business marketing support from True Food Marketing. Managed by Menter a Busnes, True Food Marketing is supported by the Welsh Assembly Government's Food and Market Development Division and the European Union's INTERREG IIIA programme.

"Last year's collection of 50 gold awards was excellent news for Wales, reflecting the high quality of food and drink now produced by the nation," said Bethan Jones, True Food Marketing's manager. "It would be great if Welsh producers could do even better this year."

The Great Taste Awards aim to recognise the very best of food and drink, supporting speciality food producers and independent retailers who are keeping British food traditions alive.

One of the judges of last year's awards, food writer and restaurant critic Charles Campion, said: " The Great Taste gold winners in 2007 from Wales all taste great and in today's increasingly industrialised, mass produced and soulless world, great tasting food deserves all the support we can muster."

Now in their 15th year, the awards are the benchmark for fine food in the UK. Last year around 4,500 foods were blind-tasted by 500 experts and those that made it through three rounds of tasting were awarded gold stars.

Like their Michelin equivalent, these stars provide a clear guide to quality. To earn a one star gold is an honour; to get two means the product is setting new standards of excellence, but to get three is to have produced food that is exquisite, one that has that indefinable 'something extra'.