LEGENDARY food campaigner, Prue Leith has been named as a new patron for next year's Malton Food Lovers Festival.

Prue is most famous for setting up Leith’s School of Food and Wine in 1975 which trains both amateur and professional chefs.

In her long and varied career she’s run a Michelin starred restaurant, headed up the School Food Trust, been a food columnist for national newspapers, written five novels and most recently appeared as a judge on the BBC’s Great British Menu.

She will be joined by by chef Valentine Warner who first studied an art foundation course in Bath before heading to London to train as a portrait painter at the Byam Shaw School of Art.

Valentine enjoyed a "reasonably successful" career as a painter, but at 23, could not resist the call of the kitchen and decided to focus his time on cooking instead of painting.

Tom Naylor-Leyland, Malton Food Lovers Festival organiser, said: “It’s an enormous privilege to welcome Prue and Valentine to this year’s festival.

" Yorkshire’s magnificent landscape produces some of the finest food and drink in the country and we are very excited to share our love both landscape and produce of what we call “God’s Own County.”

Now in its 7th year, the festival will boast a food market of over 160 of Yorkshire’s best producers, retailers and restaurateurs, and features two days of demonstrations, tutored tastings, talks and entertainment.

Organisers are recruiting further talent to feature in the festival’s line-up for 2015, so if you believe you have something special to offer, please get in touch via www.maltonyorkshire.co.uk.