Compass Group’s culinary team has been crowned La Salon Culinaire supreme champions at this year’s Hotelympia, held last week at London’s Excel.

The caterer’s competition team picked up 145 awards between them, 57 of which were gold, topping the company’s tally from the last Hotelympia two years ago.

Compass made a point of pushing young talent to the fore during the competition with its La Parade des Chefs team all under 25 years of age. The team took Gold.

Nick Vadis, Compass UK & Ireland’s executive chef, said of the group’s overall performance: “We had a strong, experienced team who were instrumental in mentoring our younger chefs. This combination of youth and experience proved to be the key.”

• The Hospital Caterers Association named Carolyn Marshall and Jill McLean from Darlington Memorial Hospital as its Hospital Chefs of the Year 2008 after they took gold in the hospital chefs class in La Salon Culinaire.

Hotelympia 2008 special awards in full

Kitchen/larder senior – Palash Gomes – Works in fat. Radisson SAS hotel, London Stansted Airport
Kitchen/Larder junior – Daniel Tennant – Show platter of meat. National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham.
Pastry senior – Philip Maes – Decorative exhibit. Park Royal, London.
Pastry junior – Heather Anderson – Decorative Exhibit. Motherwell College.
Sugarcraft senior – Nicki Johnson – Novelty cake. Creative Cakes, Poole.
Sugarcraft junior – Jennifer Orrey – Wedding cake. Barking College, Romford.
Restaurant plates senior – Ricardo Mataba. Restaurant plates. Restaurant Associates, Canary Wharf.
Restaurant plates junior – Stephanie Smith & Harry Williams. Plated three course gourmet meal. Westminster Kingsway College.
Junior grand prix d’honneur – Jennifer Orrey.
Senior grand prix d’honneur – Philip Maes
Junior live theatre – Ayr College. Kallaya Smillie, Peter Graham and Craig Rodger
Senior live theatre – Tobias Pfister – Jumeriah culinary team
Best Team – La Parade des chefs. Jumeriah culinary team
Open team grand prix – Compass Group culinary team (La Parade des Chefs, gold. Open team grand prix buffet, gold).

See our Hotelympia section for all the news and results from last week’s event here.

Get 'em while they're young >>

Compass completes chef team >>

Compass brings Junior Chefs Academy front-of-house >>

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By Chris Druce

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