Southern Lights Salon Culinaire Competitors 2017 — Mac Kotchabang, Kla Thungkao, Hunter McBride, Jack Mullany, Matt Kennedy, Daniel Keen, Tim Lindbom, Gage Switalla, Matt Kennedy (front)  by TBHS

Southern Lights South Island Salon Culinaire  Competition

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TBHS students worked hard in preparation for the Southern Lights South Island Salon Culinaire national competition for cookery, bakery and front of house students, held at Ara Timaru Campus. 

Every three years the competition is held in Timaru. This year, eight Hospitality and Food and Nutrition students took the opportunity to compete in this challenging competition: Hunter McBride, Jack Mullany, Kla Thungkao, Mac Kotchabang, Matt Kennedy, Tim Lindbom, Daniel Keen and Gage Switalla. All boys did a fantastic job for their first ever competition, and under so much pressure. They should be very proud of their efforts.

The students competed in pairs in the mystery box class against other South Island secondary students, an event where they were given 75 minutes to plate up four identical dishes with a lamb rump and surprise ingredients.

The late notification of this event meant that the students had only two weeks to source ideas and mentoring – and only had one full day and two half days of actual practice, while other schools had been preparing for a full term.

Our teams of Matt Kennedy and Tim Lindbom and Jack Mullany and Hunter McBride were second equal in the competition winning Bronze medals -an excellent result!

The competition is marked at a national level and this year saw no Gold or Silver medals awarded to any Secondary School team.

A judge from ARA has provided feedback saying that:

“An excellent result considering the time frame students were faced with. It was a huge effort for the students to step out of their comfort zone and cook in front of industry judges as well as the public. They showed enthusiasm and commitment, a credit to the school."

The Foods Department would like to thank Justin Holman (Thomas House Catering Manager), Michelle Moore (Food Technician) and Wally Katene of Ara Polytechnic for their professional mentoring and support given to the students.