Challenge is on to find creative young vege cooks
The challenge is on for pairs of Year 5 and 6 school pupils to create and plate a vegetablebased meal from ‘root to tip’.
Root to Tip Competition 2018, run by Garden to Table, with the support of RaboDirect, has Kiwi students putting their kitchen creations to the test.
Children must source their produce locally from family, community or school gardens, and turn it into a creative and delicious two-course meal.
Judges will be looking for how well students incorporate the Root to Tip theme of using as much of the fruit and vegetable as possible, their use of seasonal produce, creative use of ingredients to prepare a dish in under two hours and producing minimum waste.
Last year’s competition-winners were Otis Swallow and Noah Cobby from Diamond Harbour School in Canterbury.
Their winning dish was an entre´e of roasted baby carrots with carrot top, walnut and parsley pesto, and a potato and basil pizza with pumpkin base served with fresh ricotta cheese and ground pumpkin seeds for the main.
Al Brown, head judge of the competition, says he is excited to be involved in supporting some of New Zealand’s budding talent in the kitchen.
“I can’t wait to see what’s plated up at the regional heats and I’ll look forward to tasting the winning dishes from each region come national finals time in August.” His advice is for the regional heats, is that it’s all in the competition’s name.
“Using as much of the produce as possible in each meal, literally from ‘root to tip’, is what our judges will be looking for. The food’s got to be great to eat, and simple enough to cook really well in a competition environment too. And extra points for creativity.”
Regional heats are from June 22-24 where entries from each region compete in front of local judges for a chance to be part of the finals. The Waikato heats are at Wintec on Saturday, June 23. The national final will be held in early August in Wellington to find the Root to Tip competition winning pair .
The winning pupils will each receive a $1000 NoticeSaver account with RaboDirect, plus one-year free membership to the Garden to Table programme for their school and kitchen items.
Entries close on June 12. Enter at www.roottotip.org.nz