Young Chef 2016

Freddie McLaughlin – Clear is Kirkcudbright Rotary Club Young Chef Winner 2016

Last Thursday, the 6th October, Freddy McLaughlin - Clear, aged 15, gained first place in the Rotary Young Chef competition organised jointly by the Rotary Club of Kirkcudbright and Kirkcudbright Academy. The competition, which has been run locally for the past nine years is open to anyone aged 11 to 17 years old. The four senior pupils taking part each cooked a two course meal for two, using local ingredients, all for under £10 paid to them by the Rotary Club. This year, once again, the event was co-sponsored by Castle MacLellan Foods Limited. They helped to provide prize money, aprons bearing the Castle MacLellan logo and vouchers for cookery books.

All four students performed really well and for their efforts they were all presented with Rotary certificates. a cooking apron from Castle MacLellan. Freddy’s winning menu was crispy pan fried sea bass, served on a bed of spinach with sautéed potatoes and a home grown tomato sauce. For dessert, he served chocolate and hazelnut galette, with a dipped white chocolate physalis. Runner-up in the competition was 15 years old Lauren Burgess and in third place was 15 years old James Picthall. The prize for Best Table Setting went to Lauren Burgess.

The Rotary Young Chef Competition was designed to give young people the chance to show off their creative culinary talents, to promote healthy eating and to learn important life skills. The young chefs are all judged on their healthy menus, planning and organisational skills, hygiene, preparation skills and, of course, the taste and presentation of the final dishes.

The prizes were presented by Kirkcudbright Rotary Club past President Jean Best. As in previous years, Rotary worked closely with the Home Economics Department at Kirkcudbright Academy and particular thanks must go to Nicola Cluckie, Home Economics teacher, for her enthusiastic and tireless support of the event.

The competition was judged by Kirkcudbright Rotarian Keith Manning and by Paul Wilkinson from The Castle Bistro in Kirkcudbright. The judges were both once again enormously impressed by the dishes produced by the students. They commented that their meals would not have been out of place in many good restaurants. They also praised the Academy Home Economics Department for continuing to develop the now well established tradition of talented young chefs.

Freddy and Lauren will now go through to the next round of the competition, the Rotary District 1020 Area Competition, which will be held at Kirkcudbright Academy on Tuesday 15^th November. This stage is then followed, hopefully, by participation in the District, Regional and finally the National competitions!

In addition to the prizes awarded to them on the day, Freddy and Lauren will now also get the opportunity to spend a day working with the Development Chef in the Development kitchen at Castle MacLellan Foods. Freddy will also get the opportunity to assist Nick Nairn, the well known Scottish chef, who is appearing at the Kirkcudbright Food Festival on Sunday 23^rd October.

At the same time as the main Young Chef competition, six younger aspirant chefs took part in their own Junior Young Chef competition. Set up as a developmental opportunity for the younger students at the Academy, the six young students taking part each cooked a one course meal for two, using local ingredients, for under £5 each provided by Kirkcudbright Rotary Club. This competition was won by 13 years old Ollie McLellan who also won the best Place Setting prize. His winning menu called 'Catch of the Day', consisted of fish served on a bed of leeks and bacon with beetroot relish and lemon sauce all served with carrots and boiled potatoes. Runner-up was Jenna Henkelmann, also 12 whilst Hope Taylor, 11, finished third.

Congratulations to all who took part!                        Thanks also to Jean B for these three photographs.