It wasn’t ham and eggs for the chefs’ competition earlier this month at the historic Digby Pines Golf Resort and Spa.
And I didn’t just looketh. I was a food judge.
If you’re the type who doesn’t quail at eating six dinners and won’t duck the opportunity, being a food judge certainly stirs the lust in one’s heart.
The ingredients in six appetizers and six entrees included lobster and scallops—this is Digby after all—quail and duck. There was even an unusual mushroom that likely grows in rare earths and cost a rare fortune.
Claude AuCoin, executive chef at the Pines, was holding his annual ‘black box’ culinary competition for his kitchen staff, mainly for the culinary students.
He had earlier sent me an email that said, “I would like to invite you to come in as a tasting judge, if you can spare the time.”
Yes, I thought, I certainly can.
It’s a job I had once before and I recall afterwards people indicated some mild degree of envy.
Let me point out that food tasting is hard work and not for the weak of heart—or stomach. You need an expandable waistband on your pants to comfortably deal with a half-dozen each of appetizers and entrees. Then there’s the frequent palate cleansing with local wines.
It’s just a job.
Right….
The annual competition gives the young kitchen staff a chance to shine and display what they’ve learned in a summer’s intense work at a famed kitchen.
No matter how much we judges enjoyed their work, back in the kitchen the staff was under tremendous pressure to have the food prepared at the proper time and in the proper order.
Though it doesn’t seem fair that there was just one winner, it does sound right that his name was so French— Yves Scherrer.
Anyway, Claude, should you need another tasting judge next year….
Six courses of lust
Six courses of lust
Culinary students at the Pines given an opportunity to shine
“He that but looketh on a plate of ham and eggs to lust after it hath already committed breakfast with it in his heart” — C.S. Lewis
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