The auditorium of St Xavier’s School in Doranda was on Thursday buzzing with 50 students showcased their culinary skills at the preliminary round of Junior Young Chef, a pan-India cooking competition, organised by International Institute of Hotel Management (IIHM) in association with t2.
Looking every bit of a chef in torques and aprons, the students were divided into two groups — the junior group comprising students up to Class X and the young group comprising students between classes XI and XII. The teachers also took part.
In the preliminary round, the participants were asked to prepare the dishes at home and present them before the panel of four judges at the venue.
Aryaman Trivedi, a student of Class XI, had prepared paan-chicken —chicken keema sprinkled with sautéed almonds and cheese and rolled in a betel leaf.
His classmate Maureen Zafar chose to present the traditional murg mussalam which she prepared “over the past 24 hours”.
Rahul Shrivastava of Class VIII presented fettuccine alfredo, a pasta dish tossed with oregano and bell pepper in white sauce.
Among the teachers, Sana Shahab presented drunken brown chicken daleem using wheat dalia while Asra Sultana presented an assorted dish of kebabs such as shami, galouti and Peshawari.
“This is a pan-India event involving about 5,000 students and the finals will be held in Delhi in early 2020,” IIHM business development head Malabika Bannerjee said, adding those selected will go to the next round where they have to cook at the venue.
She said the prelims had already been held in Jamshedpur, Darjeeling and Kalimpong and the winners would be informed about the next round later.
“Many of these students are likely to go out for higher studies and they can cook their own meals if they learn this skill,” Bannerjee said when asked about the purpose of the competition.
Chef Ashmita Das, who accompanied the IIHM team, said the dishes prepared by the students were really good.
“I also tasted some of the dishes and they were simply fabulous,” teacher Ranjit Kullu said.
