One of the leading hotels in Barbados will soon be playing host to two of the British hospitality industry's rising young stars.
Marcus McGuinness and Leah Fellstad will be flying out to the Caribbean island courtesy of their success in the Young Chef Young Waiter 2005 finals. Details of their prize, which includes a cheque each for 2,000, were announced at the celebration dinner in the Members' Dining Room at the House of Commons.
The event came at the end of a long, testing day for 24-year-old McGuinness, second chef at Le Champignon Sauvage, Cheltenham; Fellstad, 25, head waiter at Rhodes Twenty Four, London; and the 14 other finalists. Having won their way through regional finals held in Glasgow, Leeds and London, they competed for the top prize in the finals held at Westminster Kingsway College.
Hearing their names announced as the winners was something of a surprise for both McGuinness and Fellstad. "Although I thought I had done my best, I was up against a bunch of very tough competitors and had no idea how well I had done against them," says McGuinness. Meanwhile, Fellstad had found the tasks facing the finalists to be much tougher than in last year's final, when she was placed third. "Everyone found it very hard work and so I was shocked to hear my name being read out," she says.
For the chefs, the day had begun at 8am when they gathered at Westminster Kingsway College to start a three-and-a-half-hour marathon of planning, preparation and cooking. Their task was to create a three-course lunch, plus an amuse-bouche, for six covers.
Two of the finished dishes were to be presented to the judges, while the other four were served by one of the waiter finalists to a party of invited guests from the hospitality industry. Each chef competitor had earlier been partnered with a waiter competitor for the duration of the final.
Free interpretation - in terms of both ingredients and style of dish - was allowed for the amuse-bouche and first course. For the main course, the chefs had to create a dish of their choice using monkfish tail, while the dessert had to be prepared from a basket of ingredients given to them one hour before the actual cooking began.
Balance, seasonality and accuracy were uppermost in the minds of the judges throughout the day. While innovation and technical complexity were rewarded, the most important aspect they were looking for was the preparation and cooking of a superb-tasting meal.
Chairman of the judges, Philip Howard of the Square in London, highlights several dishes that particularly delighted his taste-buds and those of his colleagues: a cauliflower bavarois with caviar served as an amuse-bouche by Neil ick of London's Connaught, a roasted quail starter from McGuinness and, for dessert, a panna cotta with oranges and pineapple from William Boyter of Norton House hotel in Newbridge, Edinburgh.
Overall, though, McGuinness was judged to have produced the most impressive meal of the day. "He proved himself to be a very professional, enthusiastic and able cook," says Howard. "His menu was immaculately seasonal."
McGuinness's amuse-bouche - a poached duck egg yolk, cpes and bacon cream - captured all the favours of a traditional English breakfast and was described as "a lovely idea" by Howard. "I've never been served just the yolk of an egg before."
McGuinness says that the dish was a reworking of oeufs en cocotte. "If I'd included the white, it would have made the dish too big for an amuse-bouche," he says.
His starter - roasted quail, parsley root, chestnut velout - was declared by Howard to be the best dish of the whole competition. "It was fantastically seasonal, very sophisticated, demonstrated real flair and, most importantly, was really delicious," he says.
For his main course, McGuinness cooked Moroccan spiced monkfish with pumpkin gnocchi, red wine and liquorice sauce, a dish that was influenced by his employer David Everitt-Matthias. "David uses Moroccan spices quite a lot, and they work very well with the monkfish," he says. The spicing, though, was a little too severe for some of the judges .
However, he was back on form with his dessert, which he happily produced from the basket of surprise ingredients. "I was very pleased with the choice - it gave me plenty of scope," he says. The resulting dish - roasted fig in orange caramel with hazelnut and brown sugar ice-cream served with orange caramel syrup and pain d'pice pure - was described as "excellent" by Howard.
Meanwhile, while the chefs were being put through their paces in the kitchen, the eight waiter finalists were working hard to impress front of house. The tasks facing them were intended to test them at a higher level than the competition's finalists had ever experienced before.
Newly elected chairman of the waiter judging panel, Jeremy Rata, managing director of the Devonshire Arms in Bolton Abbey, North Yorkshire, says this was necessary in order to prevent the event from becoming too routine.
"I wanted to make the competition more relevant to modern restaurants and, as a result, we made it less task-focused and more product knowledge-based, and in doing so we stepped it up a gear," he says.
Throughout the morning the young waiters had to complete a series of tests before facing the ultimate challenge - the service of a four-course menu cooked by their chef partner to a table of four.
For the lunch service, Fellstad was partnered with Borthwick of the Connaught. Unfortunately, things got off to a bad start when the amuse-bouche arrived just seconds after Fellstad had seated the guests. Then she discovered that the red wine she had served had a bad aftertaste.
Neither event, though, seemed to fluster Fellstad. "I have to handle things that go wrong all the time in my job, so I just swiftly dealt with each problem as it arose," she says.
Fellstad's ability to cope under pressure impressed the judges. "She coped brilliantly with everything," says Rata. "Throughout the final her direct and confident approach was backed up by strong product knowledge."
Rata, in fact, declared that the quality of all the waiter finalists was so good that he would be happy to employ any of them.
It is Fellstad, though, who shone through on the day. Before she flies out to Barbados to enjoy her prize, she will first face the challenge of a new job at the soon-to-be-open Apex City of London hotel as assistant restaurant manager of the fine-dining Addendum restaurant.
Originally from South Africa, where she trained at college in Cape Town for three years, Fellstad arrived in the UK two years ago from the USA, where she worked at the Farmington Country Club in Virginia. She loved working at Rhodes Twenty Four, where she says her boss, restaurant manager Ludovic Bargibant, had been a real inspiration. What does she enjoy most about her job? "Talking to people and working in locations where people go on holiday," she enthuses.
Meanwhile, McGuinness, who trained at Oxford College of Further Education and then worked at 5 North Street in Winchcombe, Gloucestershire, is looking forward to continuing his work at Le Champignon Sauvage. "It would be great, though, to eventually have a place of my own," he says.
Young Chef Young Waiter 2005
Now in its 21st year, Young Chef Young Waiter is a platform for up-and-coming young chefs and waiters to launch themselves into the limelight of the hospitality industry.
The event is organised by the Restaurant Association and Springboard UK in partnership with American Express and the Savoy Educational Trust, with support from Louis Roederer, HSBC, the Barbados Tourism Authority and the British Hospitality Association.
Professional chefs and waiters aged 25 and under working full-time in any sector of the hospitality industry are eligible to enter.
Following the regional finals in September all 16 national finalists were taken on a trip to France by Champagne Louis Roederer to visit the company's private estate and cellars in Reims.
As well as the winners' prize of a one-week trip to Barbados and £2,000 cash, the second prize winners each received £1,000 cash and a weekend for two at Pennyhill Park, Bagshot, Surrey. The chef and waiter in third place each received £500 cash and £500-worth of catering equipment from Hansens.
The finalists
Chefs
Winner: Marcus McGuinness, Le Champignon Sauvage, Cheltenham
Second: Kevin Sutherland, No 1 Restaurant, Balmoral hotel, Edinburgh
Third: Neil Borthwick, the Connaught, London
Runners-up: Mark Birchall, the Mulberry Tree, Wrightington, Lancashire; William Boyter, Norton House hotel, Newbridge, Edinburgh;
Ricky Martin, Read's restaurant, Faversham, Kent; Armand Sablon, Orrery, London; Mark York, Le Mont, the Urbis Centre, Manchester
Waiters
Winner: Leah Fellstad, Rhodes Twenty Four, London (joining Addendum, Apex City of London hotel, on Monday)
Second: Karin Ottenloher, the Westin Turnberry Resort, Turnberry, Ayrshire
Third: Joseph Durrant, Atrium restaurant, Edinburgh
Runners-up: Christine Bartsch, Ynyshir Hall, Machynlleth, Powys; Mark Bevan, Chewton Glen, New Milton, Hampshire; Katharina Dommer, Chewton Glen, New Milton, Hampshire; Simon Freeman, Hibiscus, Ludlow, Shropshire; Sabrina Klewer, Langham hotel, London