If you ever wanted proof that competition leads to excellence, look no further than your local ‘salon culinaire.’
My wife and I were privileged to be invited to the ‘2nd East Coast Culinary Competition’ held at the UAE’s Miramar Al Aqah Beach Resort last month, an event supported by the Emirates Culinary Guild (ECG) and the World Association of Chefs Societies (WACS).
According to the organiser and chief enthusiast, chef KAC Prasad, East Coast VP of the ECG and executive chef at the host hotel — not to mention Hotelier Middle East’s Executive Chef of the Year 2012 — this year’s event saw 10 hotels and more than 170 participants from Fujairah town and its coastal resort areas such as Al Aqah take part, compared to six hotels and 130 participants last year.
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All in all, there were 11 categories in the day-long competition, mainly for pre-prepared ‘static’ displays of various main course dishes and showpieces made of bread and chocolate, but also live events for fruit carving, fish and seafood cooking and cocktail mixing.
Young chefs in tall white hats milled excitedly around long tables of culinary creations, reflecting extraordinary levels of talent and artistic giftedness — food that would not have looked out of place in a sculpture exhibition or picture gallery. Some chefs stood proudly to have their photos taken next to entries marked with bronze, silver or gold medal stickers.
Others debated the merits of the pieces and the thinking of the judges, who were strutting importantly with their clip boards from one category to the other, bedecked in honorary ribbons and weighed down with campaign badges.
Still other guests, invited along for the ride, enjoyed free samples of the latest products from the suppliers and sponsors exhibition that added colour to an already wildly vivid event.
“We should not forget the people that are behind (the event), that is, the suppliers – you can see my jacket, it is full of more logos than an F1 driver!” comments chef Prasad.
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