CMC Culinary Team Earns a Silver Medal

Quick, creative teamwork and practiced fundamentals payoff in competition

Spring Salad with Rainbow Snow Peas, Pea Tendrils, Spring Radishes & Shaved Fennel Carrot Tuile, Toasted Almond Crumble and Truffled Sea Salt Cured Egg. Photo by Daniel Molina

CMC's Student Culinary Team, representing CMC Culinary Institute and the Keystone Resort Apprenticeship program, won third place and earned a silver medal (based on a point system) at the American Culinary Federation Western Region Culinary Salon held March 17-18 at Orange Coast Community College.

Over the two-day competition, the team competed in a basic skills relay where four of the team members are randomly selected to execute a series of basic culinary techniques such as knife cuts and cutting a whole chicken into pieces to be used for different recipes. The second phase of the competition consist of producing four portions of a signature menu in 1.5 hours.

The team is given one required course by the national competition committee that all the teams must produce. The teams also develop three other courses. This year's required menu item was oeuffs a la neige (Snow Eggs) - poached meringue served with vanilla custard sauce. The team would like to send a special thanks to The Seattle Fish Company and Red Bird Farms Chicken for their sponsorship of the team.

Back-to-back state championships

The team earned the privilege of representing Colorado in the region competition by winning the state competition, held at the CMC Breckenridge Campus in December. CMC Culinary Institute team holds back-to-back state championships.