Local Food Challenge entries impress the judges
Judges (from left) Ria Stout, Wayne Green and Noel Riley judge the Local Food Challenge Cooking Competition at the Wholemeal Café. Photo: Gerard Hindmarsh.
The first ever Local Food Challenge Cooking Competition may become an annual event after 20 competitors turned up at the Wholemeal Café last Thursday and impressed the three judges with their creations. The dishes were then shared around for everyone to try and comment on.
Initiated by TDC’s environmental educator Claire Webster as part of Ecofest, the idea was to create a dish (savoury or sweet) from ingredients sourced only within 200km, although there was an allowance that five per cent of any dish could be from anywhere else.
The three judges – Cr Noel Riley, Wayne Green and Ria Stout – rated dishes on creativity and originality, overall appearance and, of course, the eating experience. The dishes had to be accompanied by a full list of ingredients and their sources.
The sophistication of entries was impressive. Mark Skatrud entered a duo-dish of salmon and garden herb canapés with chervil and chutney canapés, while Averill Turnbull created a Meadowcroft Farm cheesecake and cherry passionfruit honey gelato. Sarah Macready put a tamarillo and lamb casserole on the table. Selina Brown and Fred Wingate came with a crockpot full of goat curry. Melanie Walker produced what she termed “Golden Bay Bangers and Mash”—paua sausages served on purple potato mash with salsa verde and garnished with local watercress.
Bev Boaz of Waitapu Gardens took the competition one step further by producing dishes with ingredients sourced entirely from her property. Her vegetable and beef soup contained carrot, leek, shallot, onion, potato, silverbeet, apple, garlic, pumpkin, broccoli, parsley and, of course, her own beef.
“I was even going to go down to the sea and get some salt, but that was probably taking it a bit far,” she joked.
A competitor in the Under 14 Sweet category, Ayla Riley (12) made crème brulee from free range eggs from her grandfather’s hens...
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...and topped it off with a plum sourced from a tree in Feary Crescent, while Elangio Martin (5) made berry kefir using fermented goat’s milk, which was listed as coming from her “lovely Sayra goat”.
By the end of the evening the judges were unanimous in their praise for the ability of the cooks. Noel Riley commented that the standard was incredibly high.
“It made it damn hard to judge,” he said.
Ria Stout said it was impressive that contestants could come up with such creative fare at the end of winter, not a time when there was lots of produce around, while Wayne Green said that for him it was the flair and general creativity of the entries that really shone through.
Gerard Hindmarsh
Results: Savoury over 14: 1st: Melanie Walker, Golden Bay bangers and mash. 2nd: Wendy Earle, Vegetable frittata. 3rd: Paddy Brennan, Salmon leek and potato crust pie. Sweet over 14:1st: Averill Turnbull, Meadowcroft Farm cheesecake and cherry passionfruit honey gelato. 2nd: Adelina Martin, Kambucha. 3rd: Bev Boaz, Pumpkin pie. Sweet under 14: 1st: Ayla Riley, Crème brulee. 2nd: Elangio Martin, Berry kefir.
