Quorn Foods has announced plans to create hundreds of jobs in the UK after benefiting from increased demand for meat-free food.

The company, best known for its vegetarian mince, sausages and pies, enjoyed a 15 per cent rise in UK sales over the six months of 2017.

It also made a pre-tax operating profit of £13.7milion over the same period.

As well as its success in the UK, Quorn increased sales in mainland Europe (29 per cent), the United States (40 per cent) and Asia and Australia (35 per cent).

Now, it has unveiled plans to invest £150million in its plant in Billingham, Teesside, which is expected to create 300 jobs.

Chief executive Kevin Brennan told Sky News: "The UK business is still a business with incredibly strong growth. The US is a business with enormous scale potential to us, alongside Australia and Asia.

"We are still taking a positive view on commercial investment in Europe. We continue to invest significantly into Germany, Italy and the Nordics.

"But equally we know that our category is growing everywhere in the world that if Europe gets less attractive, we can divert our growth to other places."