Ruth Hansom wins National Chef of the Year 2026
The Bedale chef-owner beats nine rivals at Le Cordon Bleu London with a sustainability-themed menu, judged by Moor Hall's Mark Birchall and Cherish Finden.
Ruth Hansom, chef-owner of Hansom Restaurant in Bedale, has won the Craft Guild of Chefs' National Chef of the Year 2026 title, beating nine other finalists in a live final at Le Cordon Bleu London on 6 October.
She placed ahead of Scott John-Hodgson, executive head chef at Solstice & House of Tides by Kenny Atkinson, who took runner-up, and Tom Heywood, head chef and restaurant-owner at Pignut & The Hare, who placed third. Ten finalists cooked under this year's theme, "Our Sustainable Future."
Judges scored each menu on flavour, creativity, technical ability, working practices, presentation and performance under pressure. Mark Birchall, chef patron of Moor Hall, chaired the panel; Cherish Finden chaired pastry.
A fifty-year trade contest, judged by working chefs, not critics.
National Chef of the Year 2026 winner
Hansom's winning three courses: an Isle of Mull scallop with girolle, kohlrabi and cobnut to start; Angus beef fillet with braised-cheek cottage pie, beef fat, Kuri squash fondant, glazed veal sweetbread and tail-end tartare for the main; and a Guanaja dark chocolate, olive oil and foraged bramble mille-feuille to finish.
"This was an exceptional final and the standard across the kitchen was incredibly high," Birchall said. "Ruth thoroughly deserves this title and I'm excited to see what comes next for her."
The win comes with an all-expenses trip to Australia, a culinary trip to France, and an invitation to launch her own Dishpatch meal kit — a list that already includes Michel Roux, Rick Stein and Paul Ainsworth.
Fifty years of the same contest
National Chef of the Year has run for more than 50 years and remains one of the trade's longest-standing tests for working chefs, rather than a restaurant-critic prize. In a separate award at the same final, Dan Conlon of Rafters in Sheffield won the Hallgarten & Novum Wines Wine Pairing Award, taking home a magnum of champagne.
Hansom, from Darlington, became the first female winner of Young National Chef of the Year in 2017. She opened Hansom in Bedale in 2024 with her husband, Mark Hansom-Rigby — a 16-cover ground-floor restaurant with a first-floor wine bar in a 16th-century building.
Ten chefs reached this year's final after live semi-finals narrowed an original field of 40. The Dishpatch kit has no release date yet; the Australia trip does.
