Students had to prepare and cook a hot main course dish for two people within a budget of £5 in a time period of 1 hour (including plating up). The boys made a range of dishes from different cuisines. The standard was very high and all thirteen boys produced a well-balanced and tasty meal. Some of the entries included fried butter chicken, fish curry with rice, risotto and burgers.

Mr Edwards (senior Deputy Head) and Mr Bason (Chair of Governors) came along to officially judge the dishes. Both judges commented on the quality of the dishes prepared, that the results were very close and how much they enjoyed tasting each of the dishes. The winners were Lucas Kitson who made a dish of pan seared salmon with green beans and Ross McLean, making chicken pesto pasta; both boys went forward to the local final held in January 2019.

On Thursday 10th January I took the two school heat winners to the local final. The event was held at Northampton College in their catering department which was quite a different environment from the food room in school. They had to produce a main course and dessert for two people within a budget of £7.50 in under an hour and a half. The boys coped very well with this and kept calm in the set up and executed their dishes successfully. Lucas won the local heat and moved forward to the regional heat that was held in Loughborough on Friday 8th February.

Rob Medhurst from HIT training was a judge in the local heat and provided Lucas with feedback and advice on how to elevate his dishes after the competition. During lunchtimes Lucas worked with the Food technician, Mrs Adams, to implement the advice from Rob, ensuring he prepared a well presented, balanced and nutritional meal. Before Lucas attended the regional final, Rob attended the school to observe and once again provided Lucas with hands on advice on a trial run of his dishes, ensuring his technique and timings were correct.

At the regional final Lucas was up against 4 students from different schools, the quality of dishes created was very high, where unfortunately Lucas was knocked out the competition.
Both boys should be thoroughly proud of their conduct and the dishes they made throughout the competition. Hopefully they, along with lots more boys will enter again. I would finally like to congratulate all of the contestants; there are some budding chefs amongst you and you all conducted yourselves brilliantly.

Finally, I would like to thank Rob Medhurst and Mrs Adams for all their support and input supporting Lucas getting to the regional finals of the competition.

Mrs Law
Design and Food Technology