High School Students win Gold & Silver in NZ Chef’s Regional Competition

Three year 12 Whanganui High School students accompanied by Linda Hardcastle, Head of Food Technology, competed at the NZ Chef’s Regional Competition 2021 recently at the Western Institute of Technology in New Plymouth. Their results were impressive.

Keylah Bouzaid-Hoggarth and Jaydene Bullock took part in ‘Hot Kitchen’ – cooking in front of a live audience. They weren’t nervous, although Keylah admits to having “the shakes” which were more of an adrenalin rush. It didn’t do her any harm as she won the Class and a gold medal with her ‘Natural Fare Soup.’

Jaydene also did well cooking her ‘Broccoli Daze’ for the National Secondary School Culinary Challenge winning a silver medal.

Both Jaydene and Joshua Christall competed in the Fonterra Cheesecake class (Fonterra sponsors the class and provides the creams cheese) with Joshua winning the class and the Gold Medal with his ‘Go Mango Go’ and Jaydene gaining the silver medal for her ‘Hearty Blueberry Cheesecake.’

Unfortunately, they couldn’t celebrate by eating a piece or two as they had done the baking early on the day and too much time had passed for all cakes to be safely eaten.

The final class winner and Gold Medal went to Keylah for her creative cupcake - ‘Serengeti High Life.’ Appropriately enough it had giraffes made out of fondant icing on the top and when cut open it had giraffe patterns.

All three had opted to do hospitality when in year 9 and year 10 and by year 11 studied to achieve NCEA standards. All three are interested in pursuing a career in hospitality.

It is not an easy option and preparing for competitions is both hard work and time consuming. They had worked after school on the Friday and Saturday from 2 to 5.30/6pm and left Whanganui to go to New Plymouth by 5am on the Sunday. And there is another competition coming up soon in Palmerston North.

Since returning, friends and relatives have been asking for their recipes.

The class winners received a $100 voucher (Keylah got $200). The students acknowledge the support they received from Dean Wang, a Chef Mentor.

River City Press 10/6/21