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Dorothy's Cheese Diggin' Truffles Brie took home the award for Best New Product in the Cow's Milk Cheese category at the Specialty Food Assocation's 2021 sofi™ Awards!
Dorothy's Cheese, located in Lena, Illinois describes Diggin' Truffles as a "soft, luscious cheese [that] features earthy black truffles: a celebration of Dorothy’s passion and the perfect terroir. The result? Flavors that evoke the past—and fill the present... Diggin’ Truffles combines earthy black truffles into a soft, luscious cheese to create a flavor explosion". This is not Dorothy's first sofi™ win--their cheese Comeback Cow won Best New Cow's Milk Cheese at the 2018 sofi™ Awards.
Dorothy's Cheese said about the win in a May 6th Instagram post, "This announcement honors the legacy which we here at Dorothy's strive to carry on through innovation and quality in each of the fine cheeses which we create, and Diggin' Truffles is truly a testament to that legacy!"
The winners of the 2021 sofi™ Awards were announced on May 5 via the Specialty Food Association's official website. 128 products won awards out of nearly 1,500 products that were entered into this year's competition. All entries are judged blindly (without packaging, price information or brand identification) by food experts in each category at the Rutgers Food Innovation Center in Bridgeton, New Jersey.
Products competing for the sofi Gold & Silver Awards are judged 70% on taste and 30% on ingredient quality. New Product entries are judged, 60% on taste, 20% on ingredient quality and 20% on innovation. Specialty Food Association defines "innovation" as: "Unexpected culinary experience in taste profile, flavor combination, use of ingredients, OR a new twist or spin on a classic; creativity in the product recipe/formulation or manufacturing process that makes the product healthier and/or sustainable; [and whether the product is] on trend with changing consumer preference and evolving industry trends". All products are judged using a point system, and the products with the highest number of points are granted sofi™ awards. A sofi™ award is considered a very high achievement in the $158 billion specialty food industry. See all of the 2021 sofi™ winners here!
Congratulations to Dorothy's Cheese and all of the 2021 sofi™ winners!