Young guns cook up a storm in Heinz junior chefs competition

Winners Marlene Breytenbach and Jason Posthimus.

Marlene Breytenbach and Jason Posthimus from Oos Moot were declared overall winners, followed by Anastasia Meyer from Hoerskool Garsfontein in second spot and Shede van Rooyen and Candice Paola from Willowridge High School taking third place.

Category winners

Rory Pimentel and Candice Harding from Hoerskool Hendrik Verwoerd took top spot in the Spirit category, followed by Sean Cullen and Georgia Abraham of CBC Mount Edmund in second place, and Karlin Nel and Nathan Liversage from Die Hoerskool Menlopark in third place.

Overall winners Breytenbach and Posthimus took first place in the starter competition; in the main course category top place went to Van Rooyen and Paola, while first place in the dessert category went to Meyer.

Martha Kok, Anastasia Meyer and Marisa Maccaferri.

Meyer was also declared the most hygienic chef followed by Erin Richards and Jocelyn Crous (Sutherland High), with Ruan Wintler and Michelle McDonald (Hoerskool Zwartkop) voted third.

The competition required both nerves-of-steel as well as creativity as 16 teams cooked a three-course meal in the space of four hours. They chose their ingredients from a mystery basket that contained a number of Heinz products including tomato sauce and soups as well as the John West spice range, pouches and salads, salmon and oysters and mussels, Wellington's infamous sweet chilli sauce and Today's ready rolled puff pastry.

The winning team received a floating trophy, gold medal and aluminum knife set while there are silver and bronze medals for the runners-up.

Taste testers

Judges included Theresa Pansegrauw of Best Rock Investments; Maritha Steyn of Steyns Culinary School; Carina Kleynhans of the Tshwane University of Technology; Marisa Maccaferri of Heinz; Maryna Verwey of the High Performance Centre; Tertius Marais of Marais Financial Services; Letitia Prinsloo of the Institute of Culinary Arts in Stellenbosch, Istelle Behrens of Dijon Catering, Juanita Venter of Milac Gold and Eagen Williamson.

For charity

A highlight was the sandwich drop to shelters run by the Tshwane Alliance for Street Children. These were made from learners at the participating schools. The bread and sandwich spreads were supplied by Pioneer.