Regional Finalists 2022-23

I sought to blend the flavors of Balinese cuisine with the memories of my roots in Tholen, a small village in the Netherlands, Zeeland province, historically renowned for its mussel culture. Now I am located in Bali, exploring, and tasting those amazing dishes and flavors. In this fusion, I weave together the essence of Bali and Tholen, capturing the essence of two worlds in one dish. It's a tribute to my journey, where the flavors of my past meet the spices of my present.

Growing up in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, my food education began with family trips to the nearby Da Pai Dang @Taman Midah where we bonded over many traditional dishes from various hawkers. My dish aims to sensibly capture the authentic flavours of my favorite street food and bring harmony to them on a plate through my own reinterpretation using my favourite ingredient that I like to cook with, Pigeon, as the star alongside local ingredients whilst practising sustainable zero waste cooking

I deconstructed Korean traditional dish 'Sinsello'.I tried to improve the limitations of traditional cooking methods by introducing modern techniques based on my experience working in different countries. I made this dish by composing it with the three elements of Korean traditional meal soup, rice, and banchan, side dishes. In addition, in consideration of sustainability, all ingredients are used for cooking so that no ingredients are thrown away after cooking is finished, ‘0 waste cooking’.

Growing up in a multicultural household in Canada exposed me to diverse cuisines, fostering a deep appreciation for Canada's melting pot of cultures. My dish draws inspiration from my favourite childhood dishes, Cantonese braised pork and abalone, and Vietnamese Banh Mi, combined with my time spent in some of Canada's top restaurants, I crafted a dish merging Chinese, European, and Vietnamese flavours. I believe that this fusion embodies Canada's cultural richness on a plate.

This dish is an homage to my mother and the time we spent in Italy together. I wanted to showcase a variety of ingredients and techniques that reminded me of Italy as well as things that she would enjoy. She is such an important part of my life and when she took me to italy, I feel like it transformed myself as person as well as the things I was passionate about. My dish is completely vegetarian because I believe in a more veg-forward lifestyle which is more sustainable for the environment.

This is the purest form of expression of my journey. This dish will take you through the beginning of my career all the way to the present. It takes inspiration from my grandmother’s impactful love for cooking transmitted to me as a young girl, to the reflection of my culinary career. My development as a chef and the learning of cultures, were turning points of finding my own identity and what has devoted me to this chapter.

With this dish I would like to express that we all have to look back sometimes when we were young and our families were cooking for us.
This dish I devote both my Grandmothers. One of them came from the Northern part of Germany that stands for the Sea part of the dish and the other Grandma came from the West part of Germany and she had a big homegrown garden. I gather two types of living and put my identity as a chef on top thus it became my Signature Dish.

With this dish I want to show my love for the italian country, people, language and its cousine. And of course all the delicious ingredients. So I took the ingredients of my favorite dish "pasta e patate" and made a variant as main plate, another variante as a satellite plate and last but not least the original "pasta e patate". Classics will never be old.

I would like to show that we can eat less meat and fish and eat more vegan or vegetarian.
You can get so many nice flavours and combinations that we can all eat less animals but still get the feeling to have eaten something special

I have to say that this dish means a lot to me, as part of my family works in livestock farming. As on most farms, they grow their own vegetables in a family garden, respecting the rhythm of the seasons. And the season of the chard coincides with the arrival of the fir buds, with their distinctive fragrance, which I have come to enjoy on my walks through the forests of the Pyrenees. It was to express my emotions in taste that I chose to naturally combine these two products.

France and my hometown, South Korea are both surrounded by the sea and is a temperate climate where produce, livestock, and seafood abound. My dish celebrates these ingredients and highlight the 4 elements that maintain the delicate balance of life: soil, sea, sky, and fungi. I believe that this philosophy will open my eyes to view humble ingredients in a different light. To keep exploring earth’s offerings by experimenting unique flavor combinations and new ingredients.

My name is Klervi. It's a Celtic name from Brittany, Bretagne region of France from my mother. She gave me the taste of the gastronomic products with the fish, the seaweeds and the buckwheat. I found this passion again few years later when I met my Mentor from Japan. We found out that the products from Bretagne and Japan are quite the same. The Colombo, is a memory from my childhood in Guadeloupe, french island in the Caribbean. The sea is the link between this 3 regions and my traveling diary.

My dream as a chef is nothing more than to be able to take my island to the highest level of gastronomy, being happy along the way. I have expressed it in this dish, using figs, lactose and corn, which is what the pigeon feeds on during its life, making 100% use of it and accompanying it with the three most typical plants of the island, which are fennel, rosemary and salicornia. With this dish I want to show that with a few simple ingredients and your own roots you can achieve a dish of great quality.

With this dish I seek to change the focus generated by some products and turn it into something more personal. Using parts of not so common products and plating them in tableware designed and handcrafted by myself.

Sustainability is a word lost in intentions. We believe that to be really sustainable we can’t only focus on our restaurant, instead we also focus in our community, our Artisans and in our region. With Sustainable Construction, Regenerative Farming and Resource Management we aren’t only regenerating this land but also this community that was long lost and forgotten. We commune all of this in an innovative way to create a unique dish where we represent all of our work.

My journey starts with sweetbread, a beloved traditional dish from my homeland, often used in my professional experience. The “in carpione” pumpkin is prepared like Lake Garda fish. The langoustine is leveraged in its entirety, as the head is filled by an orangette and sided by a coconut milk-based drink that enhances its minerality. I designed this 3D-printed compostable set, which evokes the sweetbread with its texture, to raise the commensal’s awareness on the consuming of raw material.

The dish is the result of a creative process that gives new life to discarded glass fragments, reassembled in a symphony of transparent shapes and colours. The artichoke becomes the protagonist, accompanied by fleshy elements that enhance its intensity without overpowering it, here the meat accompanies the vegetables, not the other way around. A zero-waste vision, this applies to materials as much as to food. The ferrosity of the heart accompanied by the butter mousse complete the artichoke's honesty and freshness.

I believe as human being that we are very sick. Imagination and language is what did separated humans from animal.
Today peoples are not conscious of who we really are and the consequence is that we create confusion, trends and bad ego is the protagonist in this planet. Today we try to fix this planet by using one word, sustainability.
who really know the significant of that word and who first went to see inside of the most scary place of this world? I think it is better to start from us...

The dish I have thought of is a reversion of the Christmas dish that is always eaten in my house and all over Venezuela, as it represents my first experiences with the palate. I decided to fuse Venezuelan and Argentinean gastronomy, due to my migration to Argentina when I was young, I also included Asian flavours and products from Mendoza, as they reflect all the experience I have had in the last years of my life. This dish mixes my origins, the history of my life and my passions.

On this dish I want to express the life and customs of the first inhabitants of Paraguay. hunters, fishermen, gatherers and growers, showing that with products from the Paraguayan soil, which nature gives us by applying production techniques with adequate knowledge, they can be served with great pride.
The diet of the first inhabitants was based on cassava, corn, sweet potato, banana, vegetables and fruits.
They used hunting and fishing.

All the ingridients in my dish come from the farm I grew up, I sowed them myself, and I prepared them using traditional and contemporary techniques. The aim is for the judges to eat a humble part of Colombia at its best. I want this dish to be a way to give a voice to the farmers who had to leave their land and to create reflections about the crops and dishes that call themselves sustainable but often cause damage to the countryside and the traditional knowledge of peasant families.

In Chinese culture, there is an old saying, "Eat what is in season," which means that the right time creates flavors, and if missed, one must wait patiently. Watching the ingredients in the liquid or the proliferation of fungi during the making of rice koji, I have been struck by the unique flavors these processes bring to food, reminding me of the preciousness of life. As a chef, I believe it is my duty to cherish this gift of life brought by time, allowing it to continue in a different form. I believe that this gift should not be used solely for profit, but should be shared with everyone, allowing them to experience its charm.

Inspired by the first book of traditional Chinese medicine, "Huangdi Neijing," which states that food is food when eaten on an empty stomach, but medicine when consumed by patients, I have chosen medicinal herbs such as Poria cocos, japonica rice, Gastrodia elata, and Phyllanthus emblica as the main ingredients, complemented by traditional handcrafted tea. This has led to the creation of a pure vegetarian dish, embodying the concept of food and medicine sharing the same origin.

This dish is inspired by my journey across China, from Kashgar to Hami in Xinjiang China, where I gathered inspiration from what I saw, heard, and experienced. It incorporates a variety of Xinjiang ingredients and cooking techniques, expressing my love for the region. I used the spice rub from Xinjiang's traditional whole roasted lamb to slow-cook the Xinjiang Altay lamb eye meat over charcoal, resulting in a flavorful dish.

Due to the pandemic, everything closed and people with nowhere to go turned to forests and parks. This dish is created upon mixed feelings of all beautiful tastes and aromas that forest gives and all despair of trash, tires, cut off tries in forest I have seen by walking every day in forest...

I would like to just honestly share my idea for this competition. I understand that not everyone that applies will participate however it does not mean I could try and share my journey to San Pellegrino, perhaps worldwide.
This dish represents my memories of my grandmother that I wanted to give my twist on. I applied lessons that I learned throughout my culinary journey that hopefully tells the story and what I am still willing to learn.

With this dish, I wanted to shine a light on modern Irish cooking, a combination of traditions and modern techniques. The Irish culinary heritage is firmly rooted in sustainable produce, an aspect I wanted to highlight when writing this recipe. Farming has always been at the heart of the Irish way of living, so it seemed befitting to base my dish on an animal that encompasses heritage and sustainability. Although perhaps a forgotten practice, dairy beef has always been part of our staple.

The inspiration behind this dish is the imagery of the sun reflecting on the gentle ocean waves.
The sunlight and delicate sea foam cast marbled shadows on the sand dunes below.
In the shallow waters of the sea floor, the turbot camouflages itself in the rippled shadows, swimming between the dancing seaweed, like curtains of a theatre.
The potato being the roots of the land completes the dish by complementing the flavour of the turbot and seaweed, but emulating the delicate fins of this Fish.

Through this dish, I wanted to link my 2 countries of affection which are France, my country of origin, and Australia, the country that welcomes me.
For this, there was no question of importing products from Europe, nowadays I believe that it is up to our generation to limit the environmental impact through our cuisine.
So I looked for products grown and appreciated in each of the two countries, I then selected them individually from local producers, every single product comes from Queensland.

Through this dish, I aim to showcase the harmonious blend of traditional Thai flavors with modern culinary techniques. It represents my journey and growth as a chef, guided by experienced mentors. The dish maintains the authentic taste and essence of Thai cuisine while incorporating innovative elements, reflecting a fusion of heritage and contemporary artistry. It tells a story of respect for tradition, creativity, and my passion for bringing a fresh perspective to classic recipes.

I Choose this plate because I grew up in a small town next to the sea and the area is rich in fish. I remember that every week I saw my grandmother cook this type of fish with the most of ingredients are the same and I put my signature with my techniques to present you my childhood memories

The day Slovenia proclaimed its independence the Linden tree was planted in front of the National Assembly building, since then it became our symbol for freedom. Brown trout is the most common fish of our rivers and this dish is the love song to Slovenia. I used only trout, linden in different ways, salt, and honey to prove you can make a dish with minimum carbon footprint, humble and basic ingredients but has a complex flavor profile. Whole dish is served on a set of fallen local linden tree.

Gastronomy and poetry are some of the most beautiful expressions that human beings have developed to communicate. Through creativity and innovation, they contribute to questioning in an ever-renewed way how we use culture, and our ways of perceiving and interpreting reality. I have valued this union through the concept of Haiku, poems of 3 verses that precisely talk about everyday life and nature, in a specific place and time.

Scallops & samphire are the flavour of the galette I was eating as a kid on Brittany's coast when my family was going to a "crêperie", this is why I have chosen 3 major ingredients: scallops beautiful seafood from Scotland (where I am living), samphire foraged along Scottish coast, and buckwheat reminder of the "galette de blé noir" dish of my childhood. Also by using the entirety of the scallops through the dish I want to express the importance of going toward a zero waste way of cooking.

The message I'm trying to express through my dish is that although its been said that crabs and lobsters are becoming more unsustainable due to fishing nets. I believe we can change this through designated areas of non-fishing , which will ensure crabs and lobsters become more sustainable. Crabs have been around for millions of years and its only know, due to their popularity and over fishing that we face declining numbers.

“Bringing the beauty of this world to the plate” is the message I would like to convey with this ‘pop art’ style dish.My most memorable encounter with the courgette is that of seeding on a courgette farm. This exercise peaked my interest in where produce comes from, how it’s grown and how to best represent that in a dish.The courgette is simple; yet when used correctly, it can add beauty and freshness to a dish.

My childhood was based on different gastronomic backgrounds about sharing with family and friends around food, they know me as a seafood lover. The translation of “Plebe bichi” is “naked boy”, from the slang of the northwest coast of Mexico, referring to me as a little boy and how I came to the world (naked), and how all this journey that we call life starts giving you an identity. I adapted my grandma’s east-style tamal recipe to a northwest Mexican tamal from my mom's hometown as a gratitude.

This dish pays homage to the fishermen and farmers of my hometown, Kerala. Full use of the ingredients grown, farmed, and fished in the region has shaped the cuisine into one that is humble and driven by the people who have been there for generations and for much of this time it hasn’t been showcased in a modern setting. Now in Chicago, I have begun to understand how hospitality and artistic expression can bring a cuisine like this to new audiences and evoke a connection to a foreign cuisine.

By celebrating the products and cuisine of the Chesapeake Bay I hope to generate interest in its preservation. Oysters in particular are an iconic Chesapeake Bay species that have been decimated, like many other native populations, by habitat loss, poor water quality and harvest pressure. The modern Chesapeake pantry must reflect current sustainable harvests and farmed oysters exemplify this expectation. Chesapeake chefs must adopt this pantry to maintain the watershed's rich culinary tradition.

My dish embodies simplicity, honesty, and refinement with three core ingredients: mackerel, dulse, and shiitake. Inspired by my parents' bakery, where simplicity was prized, I aimed to create a refined meal with minimalism at its core. Sustainability was crucial; I sourced locally from Belgium, minimizing the food supply chain and using all by-products to reduce waste. This dish reflects both my culinary ethos and dedication to sustainable practices.

Each ingredient of the earth and each part of an animal must be respected and valued, and this is only possible by putting a lot of love into it. I have sought here to pay tribute to them, putting meat, vegetables and the less noble part on the same footing. By sublimating our cuisine, I think we can honor nature, the producers and let people know that it is possible to consume in a fairer way with less waste.

I was inspired by the future of global nutrition: I asked myself a simple question. Where is humanity going? In terms of evolutionary nutrition and fine dining I created this vegetarian course with the reflective purpose of having an eco-sustainable impact on planet earth. I was inspired in the construction of the dish by my homeland Puglia, in Italy, and I created it in a contemporary key.