Winners of Nestlé Professional Toque d’Or enjoy prize at Royal Ascot
The winners of Nestlé Professional Toque d’Or will receive as one of their prizes for winning the 30th anniversary competition the opportunity to cook with respected chef James Tanner for hospitality members at Royal Ascot.
After beating 80 college teams and 170 apprentices in the 30th annual nationwide challenge, winners Antonia Macfarlane, Alan Martin, Rebecca Ward and Mateusz Hnatowski will cook at chef Tanner’s Queen Anne Kitchen, spending a day working with chef Adam Bateman.
They will deliver a diner for hospitality members of The Directors Club at the recently opened Principle Hotel in Bloomsbury.
In addition to the cooking prize, the winners were also awarded a place on the Canapés and Wine Pairing course at Le Cordon Bleu, tutoring with Springboard to participate in the FutureChef programme, one-on-one mentoring from CH&Co, tickets to any Merlin site and a WSET Level 2 Award training in Wines and Spirits.
The winners of Toque d’Or 2018 were announced at an awards lunch on 11 June at The Dorchester Hotel in London, which marked the last day of a series of catering and hospitality-based challenges for contestants to test essential hospitality skills.
Andrej Prokes, chef consultant at Nestlé Professional, said: “Since the competition began 30 years ago, it has gained significant recognition from the industry and has become one of the UK’s most influential training and development programs. Seeing the chefs learn and develop their skills throughout the competition is quite incredible, and Toque d’Or gives them an impressive award to add to their CVs as it’s an accolade they can be truly proud of.
“It’s amazing to see how the unique ‘money can’t buy’ experiences offered to contestants can set them up and pave the way for the future stars of our industry.”
Hnatowski, winner of the Apprentice Award, said: “It’s such an honour to win this award. After putting so much into this experience it’s great to be able to walk away with such an impressive achievement to add to my CV. I’m already seeing the benefits of winning the Apprentice Award, and I can’t wait to experience our prizes which involve cooking for some of the industry’s best.”
