CHEF Wayne Roddis went to great lengths to get the ingredients for his latest dish.

Two miles off the coast of Whitby in choppy waters in a tiny boat, to be exact.

Wayne – co-owner of Honley restaurant Mustard and Punch – made his debut as a deep-sea fisherman to catch the mackerel he needed for the Huddersfield Food and Drink Festival.

And he’s determined that the 200 fish he caught in a six-hour trip with pals will be a big hit when the festival in St George’s Square gets under way on Thursday.

Last year, Wayne and his business partner Richard Dunn came up with a pig’s cheek dish for the festival and sold 800 portions.

This year, 36-year-old Wayne is planning a dish of hot mackerel served with a new potato, spring onion and herb salad, and home-made piccalilli.

“I’ll be making the piccalilli today, to let it mature, but the mackerel will be cooked to order at the festival,” said Wayne, who trained as a chef at Barnsley College 20 year ago.

“I always prefer to know where the ingredients come from, and to try to source them locally, but it was only a chance remark from a mate over a drink that got me to Whitby.

“It turned out he had a boat, which was a small motor-powered thing, and he offered to take me out.

“I had never fished before but I decided to give it a go. We went out about a mile but nothing much was happening, so we went out still further.

“The water, which was at least 100m deep, started off very calm but started to get very rough. I put on a lifejacket but I was still a little concerned; I hadn’t swum long distances since I was at school.

“The fishing was amazing. I had a pole with six lures on it and several times I was hauling it in with six mackerel on the lines. Some had to go back because they were too small but we ended up with some brilliant fish.”

Wayne added: “Over the years, I’ve become fanatical about knowing where our produce comes from but this has been my most extreme approach to date.”

But Wayne wasn’t the only forager in action.

Angus Ferguson, managing director of deli firm Demijohn, and his staff have been scouring the lanes and fields of Huddersfield for fruit for their liquid products.

It has not been easy.

“The foraging has been very tough with the weather and the flooding,” said Angus.

“Gathering any kind of hedgerow crop is much more fun in the sun and we have had so little of it.

“Elderflower heads are key to a number of our products and we’ve struggled to find dry days to pick them over the last few months.

“We picked at one farm which was flooded out the next day and suffered terrible damage.”

The Food and Drink Festival runs from Thursday to Sunday.