WHEN it comes to food, Brown Owl knows best.

Two Easingwold mothers have launched a premium range of healthy children's ready meals, after Brownies at camp proved the doom-mongers wrong and lapped up their home-cooked meals.

Brown Owl Andrea Hayes and food scientist Elaine Stephens were so impressed with the children's enthusiasm for the meals they cooked at Brownie camp that they encouraged Andrea's husband, Andrew, to use his food industry experience and help them launch the "be prepared" meals commercially.

The result is the Martha and Lawrence range, with an initial three dishes and the two women report "extremely encouraging" response from retailers, with Booths already stocking them and other major multiples showing a keen interest.

Andrew, who worked for Nestl for ten years, said: "We are using the finest ingredients possible. For instance, all the beef we use comes from Aberdeen Angus animals from the next door farm. We know that mothers are looking for good quality, wholesome and natural food for their children and frankly, in ready meals, there's currently not much on the market."

But this is no "kitchen table" business. Elaine is a food scientist with some 15 years of experience who saw this venture as a way of marrying her food industry and science knowledge with her mothering experience.

She said: "My four-year-old son, Ben, is the fussiest critic. If he eats it, I'm on to a winner."

The first range is chicken breast in a tomato and smooth vegetable sauce; cheesy meatballs in a fresh chunky tomato sauce; and mild chilli con carne.

They are made by a small company in Patrick Brompton in the Yorkshire Dales. But new recipes using Swaledale lamb and outdoor-reared pork are now being developed. So the Brownies look set to be eating well for some time to come.

Why the Martha and Lawrence range? Mrs Hayes said: "St Martha is the patron saint of cooks, and St Lawrence the patron saint of chefs."

Updated: 10:16 Monday, October 31, 2005