Cap Maison Hotel has been holding a host of celebrity chef type events recently and on Thursday, April 21 three secondary school students got to be part of the fun. The hotel will host another event, Savour the Taste, an invitational chef event on Saturday, April 30 that will feature three of the island’s leading chefs; Chef Xavier from Coal Pot Restaurant, Chef Bobo from The Edge Restaurant and Chef Craig from The Cliff at Cap Restaurant.
The three chefs will be working together at the April 30th dinner event. As part of an Awakened Dreams element of the occasion, three aspiring chefs were chosen to compete in a Junior Iron Chef competition on Thursday to determine who would get the change to work alongside one of the three executive chefs.
Surprisingly, or not, all three final competitors for the hotel’s first ever Junior Iron Chef competition were male. The three beat out five other students from secondary schools in the north of the island including Castries Comprehensive, Vide Bouteille, Gros Islet, Bonne Terre and Sir Ira Simmons Secondary.
Initially, seven schools were asked to select one student who demonstrated talent and was passionate about culinary arts. Each student was required to write a 500-word essay stating why they should be chosen to participate in Savour the Taste and what they loved about culinary arts. The top three students from Corinth Secondary, Babonneau Secondary and the International School were then short listed to take part in the Junior Iron Chef competition.
The boys were given two protein choices, tuna or chicken and one hour and 45 minutes cooking time (not including prep time). Seconds before 11am judges announced in true Iron Chef fashion that time was up. Students were instructed to step away from their dishes and luckily everyone was done fixing their two plates. At that point it was time for Chef Craig, Chef Xavier, Chef Bill Munn from Windjammer Landing, Cap Maison’s General Manager Ross Stevenson and the hotel’s Food and Beverage Manager Mathew Hartman to taste and judge.
Terrence Joseph, a form five student from Babonneau Secondary School presented Caribbean themed dishes, grilled tuna with pineapple salsa on the side. Vernance Dore a form five student from Corinth Secondary made chicken stuffed with blue cheese and mashed potatoes with a touch of heaven. His secret ingredient was local fruit chopped finely and included into the potato mash, which the judges loved. Andre Segovia recently won a bronze medal in the Junior OECS Squash Championship in Dominica, and the student from the International School proved he was indeed a versatile young man. Segovia’s ‘Local Heaven’ dish incorporated stir-fried potatoes and mushrooms, cinnamon roasted chicken with a mushroom, garlic and cinnamon sauce and a garden salad with cinnamon vinaigrette.
In the end Vernance Dore’s one of a kind stuffed chicken and mashed potatoes won the judges’ favour. Competitors were all given tokens of appreciation from the hotel.
Before things came to an end, a hat dip would match sous chefs to executive chefs for next week’s Savour the Taste event. Vernance Dore selected Chef Bobo, Pauline Eugene from the SLHTA’s Taste the Caribbean team picked Chef Craig, while Thea Simmons a second year food and beverage management student at Sir Arthur Lewis Community College choose Chef Xavier.
Cap Maison’s Food and Beverage Manager Mathew Hartman said: “We saw a lot of originality, creativity and had a great time tasting the dishes. We expect great things from these students in the future. They show passion and professionalism.”
