Cooking up a treat!

Last weekend, Year 9 students Emily, Flavia and Lorna , and Year 10 students Izzy and Oliver , took part in the first round of the Rotary Club Young Chef Competition 2022/23, sponsored by Filippo Berio. The competition enables entrants to put their culinary skills to the test and to be judged by leading industry professionals.

There are four stages of the competition and, last weekend, our students took part in the local heats held at The Cotswold School, where pupils from our school compete against each other. Initial entries were sent in by both Year 10 Food and Preparation GCSE groups – as well as being open to all Year 9’s. Miss Lamb and Mr Smith then had the hard task of whittling the entries down to 5 contestants!

As part of the competition, each student planned and cooked a 3 course meal, with the competition aiming to encourage young people to; learn how to cook a healthy meal; develop their food presentation skills; consider food hygiene issues; develop organisational and planning skills; and develop an ability to cope in a demanding situation.

With a two hour preparation time, and a budget of £22, all of our students created fabulous mouth-watering meals. Judges included professional chefs, members of the Rotary Club and Catering Manager from The Cotswold School.

The food was all of a very high calibre including; homemade pasta ravioli; delicate strawberry mille feuille; and sweetheart chorizo chicken. There was also a cleverly displayed starter in the shape of a noughts and crosses board, beautifully cooked pan-fried duck, perfectly set panna cotta, along with homemade meatballs and spaghetti sauce.

Unfortunately, there could only one winner, Izzy, who wowed the judges with her range of skills. Izzy’s winning meal consisted of; sweet potato and butternut squash croquettes on a bed of salad with balsamic dressing; a main course of chicken stuffed with mushrooms, cream cheese and tarragon, wrapped in parma ham, served with tenderstem broccoli and parmentier potatoes; finishing with a dessert of vanilla cheesecake served with blackberry coulis.

Izzy will go onto represent the school in the district final in February.

Thank you to the judges; renowned local chef, Kuba Winkowski; Executive Head Chef of Dial House, Alex Breach; ex hotel owner, chef and Rotarian Peter Boxall; Rotarians Bob Hadley and Diana White and to Caroline Wrightson, Catering Manager at The Cotswold School. Thank you to Miss Lamb and Mr Smith for all of their help on the day, and a huge well done to all competitors – it was not an easy competition but everyone achieved menus of a very high standard. We might even see some of you on Master Chef in the future!