Regional Finalists 2022-23

"‘Geumtae(sea perch)’ is a fish that reminds me of the fish market near my grandmother's house in Busan, Korea. This market, named 'Jagalchi,' is a place that demonstrated the wonderful magic of seasonal seafood caught by fishermen being transformed into delicious dishes through the medium of cooking. Furthermore, I believe that cooking with locally sourced ingredients contributes significantly to supporting small businesses and preserving the heritage of traditional local cuisine.

I choose this dish because my mom used to cook this for me and now I cook it for my son. I wan to represent thai heritage dishes in a modern way, to reflect that if the products are treated with love and respect, so the dish will be. I refine the flavours and techniques to elevate it even more, to show the proud heritage of the Thailand ingredients and recipes.

Through the San Pelegrino competition, I would like to make new Korean dish that is interesting and delicious to people in a fun way with familiar ingredients.

Furthermore, I would like to develop a recipe that can reduce food waste that affects environmental pollution.

This dish only uses sustainable ingredients that are locally available in the winter months. When most restaurants are relying on imported produce, local farms are still providing us with root vegetables and apples. On the rocky beaches, the oysters become plump and sweet. I hope to communicate a sense of place and a sense of time, and to show that local eating goes beyond the bounty of the summer months. In the pared-back simplicity of winter there is still beauty and flavour to be found.

This plate is a representation of my core believes as a Chef, cooking with nostalgia, locally raised ingredients that are of great quality and treating them with care. The locally sourced rabbits is paired with carrots, Hen of the wood mushrooms, Swiss chard- all grown in and around the city, this is probably what the rabbit ate for dinner! The whole animal is used in the dish giving it all the respect it deserves and a true display of what food systems in the industry.

L’Aube au féminin celebrates all that embodies femininity in all its richness and diversity. Rooted in the earth, the beetroot represents strength and resilience; in pink, it celebrates beauty and gentleness. The flowers echo this gentleness and evoke kindness through their healing power. The female duck, the centrepiece of the dish, embodies protection, instinct and freedom. This dish pays tribute to those who infuse every new dawn with light and vitality.

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

The dish is intended to convey an honest image of the region, the botanical garden near to the restaurant reimagining the pleasure of traditional ingredients through a variety of preparation methods.
The ingredients can be found in the immediate vicinity. The dish shows the diversity of flora and fauna. To ensure sustainability roots, leaves and innards are used following the approach of ‘nose-to-tail’. It’s intended to promote the sustainable enjoyment of ingredients and create honest enjoyment.

My dish reflects my connection to my homeland, reinterpreted in a modern way.

I want to honor the resources that the world provides us through sustainable action. For this reason, among other things, I chose a veal head, a cut that is often considered "unknown," and aim to transform it using refined, high-quality, and precise techniques.

For me, the future of cooking lies in treating ingredients with respect and making use of every part of them.

I chose to use the whole squab. The main plate features the breast and its garnish, followed by a finger-food course served with a finger bowl. The dish evokes the squab’s world, from farming and feed to preparation. The aim is to show that a main ingredient can be elevated while minimising waste throughout every stage of the process.

I have always been fascinated by what grows around me and the techniques different cultures have developed to bring out the best of their terroir. This dish celebrates that curiosity through trout from lac léman and carrots and herbs from our farm. Drawing on techniques learned through my travels across Asia and Europe, and from my grandmother, I use every part of the produce—from peels to carcasses—to reduce waste and create a cuisine that is sustainable, delicate, and harmonious.

I see cuisine as a means of transmission. It brings pleasure while questioning our relationship with living things. This dish embodies that belief. The Grise du Vercors, a breed preserved from standardisation, is used in its entirety. Guided by phronesis, I seek thoughtful choices rooted in its terroir. Each element conveys a simple idea: value lies in what we choose to preserve, despite time and constraints.

The dish represents my whole essence as a cook and as a person. It evokes my Italian-Granadian roots. It is a journey through the 5 senses that reflects my culinary maturity learned so far. At the same time, it aims to show diners the values that represent my cuisine. Love for the profession, respect for the raw material and sustainability with the environment.

I chose this dish because it tells the beginning of a journey—both a personal one and a real one. It starts with the prawn ravioli, the first recipe I discovered when I joined AS: a single bite that captures the full flavour of the prawn in a liquid ravioli. It continues with the chawanmushi and tableware inspired by our trip to Taiwan, and ends with Japan and Thailand, celebrating the simplicity of raw ingredients and their countless teas.

The dish is a representation of my origins, I don't have a Spanish culinary tradition because my mother was born in Venezuela, and my father in Germany, although my grandparents and I are Andalusian.
I express in this gastronomic representation what I consider to be my causalities, the origin of my parents has had a direct effect on my concept of gastronomic culture.
There are three culinary elaborations with the same value: an Iberian consommé, a hallaca of cuttlefish and a red mullet cooked in a flame...

With this dish, I would like to express the concept that the replacement of animal protein with vegetable protein, allows the dish to have an equal taste, thus reducing the environmental impact, being also environmentally friendly. I hope, in this way, to succeed in approaching all food intolerances and pathologies that do not always allow the guest to feel free and involved in the free and varied choice of multiple dishes.

My dish showcases the biodiversity of Alta Langa using every part of the lamb, emphasizing sustainability and respect. Combining tradition and innovation, it draws inspiration from historical local recipes. This dish reflects a deep connection with the land, honoring the region's culinary heritage and presenting it in a modern, creative way.

I believe the future of cuisine lies not in doing more, but in better understanding what we already have. In this dish, the whole duck is celebrated, with each part transformed into a different expression. The fermented rhubarb conveys the value of time, while fire and smoke speak of memory and instinct. It is a portrait of the chef I am today and the chef I want to become: mindful, responsible and guided by a search for meaning as much as flavor.

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.

Goat is a typical product of my region Mendoza. I have eaten it since my childhood, my grandfather taught me how to cook it on a flame but I never experimented with other cooking methods, so it became a personal search of how to transform it and find other textures, flavours and combinations that complemented it. I want to show that with the same product I can achieve different preparations by working it 100% without wasting anything from head to toe, mixing migratory cultures.

This dish is rooted in a dual heritage: bananas, a key ingredient in Costa Rica’s history, and my mother’s cooking. I still remember the boiled green bananas sautéed with caramelized onions that she served alongside chicharrones, a combination that shaped my childhood. Today, I use the fruit, peel, and blossom of the banana to honor that legacy and bring together, on a single plate, the memory of a country and that of my home.

China is a country with vast territory and abundant resources, and each region has its own special ingredients. This dish uses the loin of Tan sheep originally from Ningxia, which like to lick salt in the Gobi Desert.

Pickled with Sichuan pepper and spices for oil seal, with yunnan spring and summer wild bacteria made of wild cheese, fermented corn is more delicious, sweet and delicious, showing the style of Chinese wilderness.

The whole dish is like a tan sheep from the Gobi Desert, placed in the Yunnan mountains rich in wild bacteria. Corn plays the role of pastoral scarecrow, paired with western dishes and mints and herbs associated with Yunnan's native eatery habits.
 

I have been training in the culinary arts since I was 14 and that set me on my career path. It allowed me to gain a thorough understanding of Western gastronomy and culinary techniques. But I have never veered too far from what is familiar to me; Chinese cuisine is etched in my memory and I am mesmerized by it. Coupled with foreign elements, it has sparked whimsical surprises in my style of Chinese cuisine.
 

The dish presented by Alchemist restaurant, calling for a reduction in ocean plastic, has inspired me and made me realize that ocean pollution is not far from anyone. I live in Zhuhai, Guangdong Province, a coastal city with abundant seafood resources that is also affected by pollution. Therefore, I hope to use my dishes to raise awareness and urge people to protect the ocean.

Over 800 million people around the world go to bed hungry each night. At the same time, one third of all the food that is produced for human consumption is wasted, and obesity is one of the western world’s most pressing health issues.

Hunger is one of modern civilization’s great paradoxes, since it is a problem that already has a solution. The cure for hunger is called food – and we already produce too much of it.

 

I am a chef driven by curiosity, and respect for ingredients. Today, I shape my identity through Nordic flavors and technical performance. In the future, I aim to become a chef who unites craftsmanship and sustainable, creates experiences that move people, and contributes to pushing gastronomy forward.

With this dish, I want to show that worldly flavors can be achieved with products from our own country or region, promoting sustainability and supporting local farmers and suppliers. This dish is entirely based on vegetables and fruits, and contains no animal products. By doing this, we challenge ourselves and demonstrate that the same flavors can be achieved without using animal ingredients.

My yakitori is a unique take on the classic Japanese dish, combining traditional flavours with Italian and Australian elements and techniques, delivering a dish that is at once familiar, but unique in taste and texture.
Rather than a traditional yakitori sauce, I cured the egg yolk using colatura di alici, before using the latter to create a gel balanced with dashi that has a unique umami flavour.
My yuzukosho draws on fermented jalapeño for a complex umami flavour, lime zest, juice.

I was born and raised in Sichuan, China. With my professional training from Le Cordon Bleu in Australia, I found Australia can be a bridge of combination of two completely different flavours and cultures. I have considered South Australia as my second home, and I love the wide range of fresh ingredients and indigenous products. I want to bring the authentic Sichuanese flavour to South Australia and create my own food style inspired by modern western cuisine in the short future.

My dish is based on my culinary journey: I am Indian by birth and I moved to New Zealand when I was 18 and I've been working in Tamaki Makaurau for the last 10 years, surrounded by the ocean. I want to showcase the best of seafood found in the country and also merge it with my Indian heritage in a subtle way by using dried fenugreek leaves with some of the main ingredients found in a lot of Indian food.

The story behind this plate starts with a deer and pumpkin. Because I want to take every chance to make my own home grown plants, last spring I planted pumpkin seeds at the edge of the forest, 50 meters from my restaurant. One morning when I walked to my pumpkin field to check up with my ripe pumpkins, I saw that one had a bite taken off. I knew that there has been a deer eating my pumpkins. That is why I decided to connect three main ingredients: Deer, pumpkin and mushrooms. This is my story.

In a world of abundance, we need to look at a more nursing future. Sourcing ingredients has become paralysing for our planet. Due to over-fishing and over breeding, there is a big impact on the bee lives that provide us reproduction, which is necessary for our lives. In my dish, I combined sustainable farmed sea bass, free range pork and ecofriendly bee products from our little country. The dish shows how important sustainability is and also how the elements of nature are and can be connected.

This dish is my culinary signature and a tribute to Slovenia. It features ingredients deeply rooted in our land and the collective memory of our people. Reflecting where I grew up and create today, the plate mirrors my evolution as a chef. My goal is to make modern gastronomy approachable, telling a story that is simple yet complex, boutique yet intriguing. Through the lens of the past, these elements narrate our present and forecast a future where modern dining feels like home to everyone.

Through a desire to seek out and understand culture outside of my own, I have been able discover so much about myself and the food I want to create. I am inspired by the flavours/methods of the world, and I want to use what I have discovered by cooking delicious food without boundaries. Ode to Sam Yee is an homage to my partner who has shared her culture with me. This dish combines Chinese flavours with my classically trained French cooking methods. This is about creating new traditions.

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.

Rather than recreating tradition,I chose to reinterpret them through the experiences,techniques,that have shaped me as a chef.Culinary techniques create layers of flavor and texture that reflect both where I come from and I have evolved.At the heart of my cooking is respect for the product.Every ingredient has its own character.My role as a chef is understand it,treat it with care and reveal its full potential.My dish is an expression of my identity,my experiences, and the values that guid me.

My dish is a homage to my mom. Being an immigrant, my mom has faced a lot of obstacles with my grandma (mee-maw), but the first time they were able to bond was through growing potatoes of all things. Now, every couple of potatoes are filled with the same excitement as that day she shared digging them up with my mee-maw. This dish is a portrayal of my mom’s garden with a mix of Filipino and American flavors, with hints of the chickens that try to pluck her harvest before fruition.

This dish is a story and reflection of my life as a chef;
Typically Banchan (Korean side dish) is a variety of small dishes accompanying a main dish generally reflecting the area they come from. Each Banchan will reflect a a moment in my life through places that I have travelled as well beliefs found along the way whilst maintain my rules and ethics of clean and fair food that’s locally sourced in a sustainable way.
The Six Core Values of my Food
Fire, Clean, Delicious, Refined, Innovative, Tec

Since I began cooking, I have been troubled by the lack of representation of Indigenous and Latin cuisines in elevated food expressions. In this dish, I am sharing the cookery I have learned professionally, and what I have learned in the kitchen of my Abuela. Masa, the fuel of Latin American cuisine, and Poulet Farci on one plate together. I want everyone who eats this, to enjoy the complex flavors of Latin cuisine, juxtaposed with a European protein execution and plating that combines the two.

My cuisine champions a respectful approach to ingredients and local producers. I seek to make the most of every part of the animal to reduce waste and pass on genuine culinary knowledge. Through this dish centered on pigeon, mushrooms and potato, I want diners to experience the flavors of a Belgian autumn and enjoy a vibrant tasting journey designed to showcase each preparation and tell a story over the course of the meal – all with sincerity and a spirit of sharing.

I chose this dish to enhance the Italian tradition, to combine a poor dish like Tuscan fish soup and Grano Arso flour, made with fish and crop waste products, with the technique and refinement of a gastronomic restaurant, in order to have a dish that tastes like home in an elegant and refined style.

Through this vegetable dish, the idea is to show that a simple product can become a complex and flavorful dish on its own. You can get a range of different flavors and textures through lacto, cooking, or the combination of products.