Student Chefs Earn Honors at World Food Festival

Teams of young chefs from area high schools competed in the 2012 COUNTRY Financial® Cooking Challenge at the World Food Festival this past weekend. And culinary art students from Central Campus were top competitors.

On Saturday morning, the high school teams shopped for fresh ingredients at the Downtown Farmers’ Market, and then raced to start the challenge at 11:00 AM at the World Food Festival location in the East Village. The teams had one hour to prepare their meals.

The judges for the Cooking Challenge were Jannay Towne, anchor and reporter for WHO-TV 13; Simon Conway, WHO Radio host; and Kristin Porter, Iowa Girl Eats blogger.

Points were awarded to each team based on the taste of their dish and their creativity in using the Market ingredients they purchase.

The first place team of Danielle Stewart, a Roosevelt senior, and Emmanuel Contreras, a Lincoln senior, made roasted potatoes, grilled sirloin steak with chipotle butter sauce and served it with a salad with raspberry dressing and glazed peaches for dessert.

The third place team of Colton Ruegsegger, a senior from Hoover, and Isaac Orozco, a senior from Lincoln, made a beef stew with fresh vegetables including purple potatoes, yellow squash and tomatoes.  They served their stew with an arugulas/ strawberry salad and garlic toast.