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Location: Blogs Chef Nick Martin
Posted by: chefnick	Saturday, March 10, 2007
No nothing to do with the Law, It's the Law of A Kitchen... I've been invited to be the Judge at kendal college on friday 16th march at the, Inter College Cookery Challenge, teams from Carlisle, Barrow and kendal will battle it out for the trophy, I'm over the moon to take part in this as it will be some of the best young chefs of the county of Cumbria taking part, and there are some pretty good chefs in this part of the North West, " You only have to ask Yannick Lequitte " of Kendal College, We talked with great passion and pride on the phone as he told me of his plans for this programme, I have to Judge on, Table Presentation, Hygiene, the service standard of the meal, Customer Skills, The Knowledge of the dishes, Preparations, Presentations, Flavour, Content, Origionality, And my favourite, Kitchen condition ( after service )... All along with Tasting all the dishes, I'm very lucky to be asked to take part in this, As i was actually trained at both Kendal and Carlisle colleges in my younger day's a a chef back in the 80s, And we have all come a long way since then, Nick....

Comments (1)

Re: The Right Honourable " Judge Nick "

By chefnick on Sunday, March 18, 2007

Well this was a real eye opener for me,
I turned up in the morninig at kendal college to greet the students,

and from the start I knew it was going to be a day of culinary treats,

We presented the table of ingredients for the students to create there menus from,

I walked around the kitchen listening in on there whispers about what they were going to do with the Turbot, the red mullet, the celeriac, the butternut squash, the lamb racks, the king prawns,the baby pineapples,the barbarry duck breasts,the spinach,

well as you can imagine my head was scattered,

but give them the respect they so rightly deserve,

they got there heads down and started producing there menus,

It slowly turned into a one horse race,

the team from kendal where methodical in there cooking, menu planning , communication, kitchen skills and food knowledge,

the team from west cumbria where good with each other, the menu they created was a vast array of different flavours and textures,

the team from barrow sadly kind of lost there way with there plans but gave it there best shot,

at the end it was in no doubt that the team from Kendal had pulled away from the pack and deservedly won the competition,

they produced,

Seared fillets of red mullet,fennel puree and pickled apple dressing,

Roast breast of barbarry duck with red wine glaze,fondant potatoes and spinach,

roasted baby pineapplle with lime panacotta and chilli syrup.

well i was touched by there training as it showed so well,

Yannick Lequitte from kendal college shown the face of a very proud tutor as he watched his team collect the winning trophy,

as it is his training and experience that showed through with these young chefs and probably will do for many years to come,

Nick...