Students cook up taste of Orient
YOUNG MasterChefs at King’s Girls’ Division took guests on a tour of the Orient as they prepared a dinner fit for emperors in the school dining hall.
The silver service event was the culmination of a week-long course for the culinary kids both as part of a busy kitchen brigade and a polished front of house team.
The teenagers in Year 10 learned all about the demands of an industrial kitchen – from buying the best at a fair price to balancing food groups, polished silver service and health and safety among the hobs – in a week-long course on contemporary, classical and oriental cuisine.
Chartwells’ Bringing the Fun Back into Food manager James Plumridge said: “The food industry provides a wide range of career opportunities with exciting and creative challenges and for many of these students it will also allow them to find part-time work, especially when they are at university. Our intensive food preparation course is designed to give them a basic set of skills and whet their appetite to learn more.”
He added: “We chose an oriental fusion menu and had the students making exciting and exotic dishes from scratch, and they couldn’t believe how easy it was. They cooked spring rolls and at first were daunted by the thought, but then discovered if you follow the rules it’s simple.”
The week-long programme culminated in a gala dinner for 100 guests, the young chefs having been divided into different sections in the kitchen – with special sommeliers, silver service waiters and front of house staff producing all the glitz, glam and good service of a five-star function.
Guests ate handsomely, with Miso soup among the starters, teriyaki salmon a popular choice for main and coconut ice cream to cleanse the palate. The event raised over £300 for charity Maggie’s at the Christie.
Principal of King’s Girls’ Division, Helen Broadley, said: “If you can cook for yourself and your family you can moderate your intake of salt, sugar and fat, lead much healthier and longer lives and get so much more pleasure from eating and entertaining.
“It’s as much a key life skill for both young men and women as it was in previous generations and this generation is blessed with a greater variety of fresh produce, more knowledge of global cuisine and exacting detail of what we should and should not consume.”