Winning Ways to Celebrate Cauliflower

Winning Ways to Celebrate Cauliflower

HSI, in partnership with vegetables.co.nz, invited New Zealand school students to enter the 2011 cooking competition, ‘The Great New Zealand Vegetable Dish – an HSI Junior Hospitality Challenge Special’. Students in Year 11-Year 13 were eligible for the competition.

The dish had to star cauliflower as the key ingredient, and all vegetables used in the recipe had to be fresh New Zealand grown vegetables. A judging panel chose thirteen finalists from schools around the country, and their dishes were recreated, tested and tasted by four judges.

Those judges were Mark Wylie, Executive Chef at SKYCITY, Jeremy Schmid, Chef/Owner of Auckland’sTwo Fifteen Bar & Bistro, Pip Duncan, Food Services consultant, vegetables.co.nz, and Mark Dronjak, Chef and Schools Manager for HSI (the Hospitality Standards Institute). The chosen recipes range from a cauliflower cake that includes cinnamon and pineapple, a tasty pickle of cauliflower, kamokamo and horopito and a tower of cauliflower and crab, through to cauliflower and goat’s cheese parcels and a cauliflower soufflé with blue cheese and nutmeg. One of the most unusual was a cauliflower panna cotta, with blue cheese foam.

The winners are:

Overall winner: Napier Girls’ High School, Napier; student Sarah Stoney, for her Cauliflower rice and lime confetti salad; Teacher: Sarah Shand

Second place: Waitaki Girls’ High School, Oamaru; student Rakayla McGartland, for her Cauliflower tasting plate: Blue cheese and cauliflower soup; Parmesan and parsley crumbed cauliflower; and Cauliflower fritters with cauliflower puree; Teacher: Pam Ambler

Third place: Botany Downs Secondary School, Auckland; student Andrea Swart, for her Cauliflower soufflé with blue cheese and nutmeg; Teacher: Prue Rehu

The judges said winner Sarah Stoney’s salad was a clever, simple and inspirational dish, show-casing cauliflower, and commended the two runners-up. All agreed that the standard of the finalists was high, and congratulated the students and their teachers for their creativity.

Sarah’s prize is an iPad 2, and all three will each receive a copy of The New Zealand Vegetable Cookbook, by Lauraine Jacobs, Ginny Grant, & Kathy Paterson.

A specially designed e-book, with the winners, and the finalists’, recipes and photographs will be available for free download from both HSI’s and vegetable.co.nz’s websites in December.

The finalists, in alphabetical order of schools, are:

Botany Downs Secondary School, Auckland; student Andrea Swart, Cauliflower soufflé with blue cheese and nutmeg; Teacher: Prue Rehu

Hamilton Girls’ High School, Hamilton; student Cassie Dean, Spicy cauliflower with chickpeas; Teacher: Irma Cooke

Howick College, Auckland; student Broghan Lamb, Decadent cauliflower soup with roasted red capsicum purée and toasted pumpkin seeds; Teacher: Rachel Emmanuel

Napier Girls’ High School, Napier; student Sarah Stoney, Cauliflower rice and lime confetti salad; Teacher: Sarah Shand

Nelson College, Nelson; student Richard Craig, Duo of Cauliflower: Sous vide cauliflower with melba toast and pear puree; Cauliflower panna cotta with a blue cheese foam; Teacher: Quinton Gately

Oxford Area School, North Canterbury; student Mitchell Fowler, Curried cauliflower with cardamon and mustard, served on yellow rice; Teacher: Maryon Beer

Palmerston North Girls’ High School, Palmerston North; student Sheila Cagaoan, Manawatu cauliflower and Foxton Beach crab tower with lemon; Teacher: Vanessa Taylor

Queen’s High School, Dunedin; student Chanelle Carter, Cauliflower Medley: Simple cauliflower; Pickled cauliflower; and Ranch cauliflower, served with soda bread; Teacher: Alison Lambert

Southland Boys’ High School, Invercargill; student Nico Parry, Cauliflower croquettes; Teacher: Scott Richardson

St Patrick’s College, Upper Hutt; student Patrick Cook, Cauliflower cake; Teacher: Nicola Potts

Te Kura Kaupapa a Rohe o Mangere, South Auckland; student Michaela McLoughlin, Cauliflower, kamokamo and horopito pickle; Teacher: Angela Batt

Wainuiomata High School, Wainuiomata; student Roger Whioke, Cauliflower and goat’s cheese parcels; Teacher: Sarah O’Neil

Waitaki Girls’ High School, Oamaru; student Rakayla McGartland, Cauliflower tasting plate: Blue cheese and cauliflower soup; Parmesan and parsley crumbed cauliflower; Cauliflower fritters; Teacher: Pam Ambler

For more information, see www.hsi.co.nz/schools.

Note: HSI is the industry training organisation for hospitality, and also works with school hospitality teachers to encourage future stars into the industry.

Vegetables.co.nz promotes the taste and inspiration of fresh grown New Zealand vegetables. They provide a wide range of printed material, covering meal and recipe ideas, cooking vegetables, advice on healthy eating and nutrition, for school projects, teachers, chefs, educators and produce retailers.

ENDS

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