Food and Travel magazine, the UK's market-leading gourmet travel magazine, has launched its first-ever Reader Awards to celebrate the best in class in the worlds of food, wine and travel.
 
The categories cover the wide spectrum of areas that are synonymous with the newsstand title: best gourmet destination, restaurant, hotel, tour operator, specialist retailer, airline, chef, book, cruise line and cookery school. Voting can be done either at www.foodandtravel.com/awards or by using the form in the latest edition of Food and Travel magazine. 'We've been on the newsstand for 14 years and we've always been known as the authority on gourmet travel,' said Alex Mead, editor of Food and Travel.

'It's our 150th issue in October this year and we decided that having awards chosen by our readers was long overdue. They have exceptional knowledge when it comes to everything from restaurants and cookery schools to tour operators and airlines, so we're confident our readers are going to honour those who thoroughly deserve it.'
 
Publisher Gregor Rankin, who launched Food and Travel in 1998, commented: 'Eating what and where the locals eat, whether it's in the next town or the other side of the world, is an easy way to scratch beneath a destination's surface, understand its history and to become part of its community, and when you include 'insider' local knowledge on where to stay and what to see and do as well, then you have the essence of Food and Travel's appeal.

'In the past 18 months, we've not only launched a new website, www.foodandtravel.com, but also a number of foreign language editions of Food and Travel magazine, reflecting the strength of food tourism around the world and people's desire to seek out 'best in class' in all aspects of food, wine and travel. Our readers have been central in helping us achieve this and so it is fitting that we're giving them their own awards to allow them to reward those who deserve it most.'

Readers can vote at www.foodandtravel.com/awards or by using the forms in the latest issue of the magazine.
 
For more information, contact James Stuart on 020 7501 0519 or email james.stuart@foodandtravel.com 
 
www.foodandtravel.com