School pupils saw their special soup recipe stirred into life at Baxters famous food factory.
The young people from Milne’s High School were given a rare opportunity to visit the Fochabers plant yesterday.
As part of a challenge set by the company, 68 S2 pupils were tasked with creating a soup that would appeal to teenagers and contain two portions of the recommended daily intake of fruit and vegetables.
Industry experts from Baxters, other local businesses and the Scottish Food and Drink Federation (SFDF) judged entries from the teams at an event held at the Fochabers school.
The winning team, Soup-er Scots, beat off the competition with their Gamekeepers Gun Roast soup, made with venison, pheasant and vegetables.
Although Connor McGill was absent, the other three Soup-er Scots team members Shaun MacLeod, Euan McLean and Christopher McGill saw how their recipes was scaled up and put into production on an industrial scale.
After making the soup, Euan, 12, said: “It was great. We were shown loads of practical jobs, and it was cool to see how an empty can can turn into a soup in 26 minutes.”
The challenge, a part of SFDF’s schools programme, asked pupils to incorporate home economics, product marketing and label design into their offering.
Alison McDonald, Senior Development Technologist at Baxters, said: “This was a fantastic opportunity for the pupils to engage in a very exciting and realistic project.
“It is an excellent example of curriculum for excellence linking five different subjects into one project and allowing for pupils to excel in various areas.
“The boys were a credit to their school during the visit, and we have all been really impressed with their exceptional teamwork.”