Regional Finalists 2022-23

I consider that the food with genuine sentiments is the most delicious, but at the same time, the most challenging to make— the cuisine that tells a story. Through my cuisines, I want to share with people the story weaved by my experience of travelling, precious memories and the island have nurtured me and raised me up – Taiwan. I wish my guests, by eating the warm delicacies, can be moved and realize that their days can also be pleasant and heart-warming.

I want to present my Cantonese cuisine background. I have four years experience at various traditional Chinese restaurants. Dim sum and traditional Chinese food are central to my identity. I aim to showcase Chinese cooking and beautiful local dried seadfood by reconstructing classic dishes into fine dining plates. Lastly, I want to convey that culinary boundaries are blurring as techniques are shared globally. We can learn from other cuisines to achieve higher culinary excellence.

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.

The Shepherd offers his healthiest lambs, either for feasts or as a sacrificial meal every year by monotheists alike, in suit of Abraham's sacrifice to god. It is tradition to use a healthy lamb that is at least a year old. I wanted to honour this abiding tradition by encompassing the subtle yet rich flavours of the animal, complimented with locally foraged seasonal vegetables. This is an exploration of a harmonious dance of textures, temperatures, and flavours.

This dish reflects my life and experiences—a blend of French culinary skill and comforting home flavors from Canada as a multicultural nation. Montreal's Chinatown was my sanctuary, sparking my fascination with diverse culinary traditions, inspiring me still today. Cooking, for me, is love and passion, rooted in respect—using every part of ingredients, minimizing waste, letting flavors shine. Join my journey as a French-Canadian chef celebrating diverse influences shaping my culinary identity.

Vegan food, through methodology and expertise, belongs on the world stage. Vegetables can be a complete substitute for any animal product. Vegan forward diets reduce factory farming practices, and when we eat meat, we should source local and ethically raised products.
Fallon recognized the harsh realities of raising cattle. She realized cultivating mushrooms was the way of the future. These are generational farmers who shifted their focus for the environment, their courage deserves recognition.

My dish is intended to showcase the colourful diversity and wonderful flavours of my homeland. The idea of my dish is based on my experiences and the various inspirations of my career. I want to put my homeland and our great produce centre stage.

Seasonality and regionality play a fundamental role for me when creating my dishes.
Going through the world with open eyes, seeing what nature has to offer, helps me tremendously when creating new dishes.
I want to know where my products come from and how I can use the conditions of my environment for my dishes. Products should find their way onto a plate when they are available on the market in the best quality it can offer. The goal should always be to use the full potential of all products.

Tikka Masala - a dish that started my culinary journey. It captivated me as a chef's apprentice with its layers of flavor, the first dish I mastered and the one that won my wife's heart, as the first dish I cooked for her. For this competition, I present it in two ways: whole, to enjoy it fully with all flavours present. But alongside it, a deconstructed version with all elements still present and polished, presented to highlight its individual mastery.

Heritage expresses my belief that the future of cuisine is not only about innovation, but also about preserving knowledge. Chicken, a universal ingredient shared across cultures, is the foundation of this dish. A whole chicken is separated, each part transformed through a different technique, and reunited on a single plate. This process reflects the essence of French cuisine: understanding an ingredient, transforming it, and creating unity from diversity.

My dish associates two opposed universe: the "meaty" one from the Chateauneuf farm beef and the iodized one from the cuttlefish and the herring eggs
These three product prepared in their entirety will along the preparation and then degustation respond and feature them self. They will reveal their complexity and the deepness of their taste but still with a strong readability.
A key quest to the essential in the idea that “less it’s more” in this special social and environmental context.

As I grew up in Saint-Raphael, fish soup had an emblematic place in my family. My father, a fish lover, observed changes in the sea ecosystem: pollution, destruction of the biodiversity and diminution of the quantity of fish. We can’t keep our old habits by cooking without thinking about the consequences. I don’t want to forget the taste of Provence so I invented a new recipe that take into account these issues. More ethical ways can be taken to archive the emotional memory of taste.

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.

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.

I would like to express the evolution of nuances and flavours that develops in cold-ripened sea bass without humidity. The maturation of pork pieces is a technique widely used in our area, it is carried out in the winter months in order to take advantage of the dry cold. The impediment of having fresh fish available on a daily basis has led us to implement this technique and adapt it in the restaurant to achieve a regularity in quality and a product with a great complexity of flavour and nuances.

I began cooking out of necessity, having grown up without a safety net. Then it became a language. Caruggio tells the story of a walk through Sanremo, from the sea to the mountains, along narrow alleyways that bring contrasts together. It uses only ingredients found along this route, chosen for what they are. To me, respecting an ingredient means applying the right heat at the right moment. I want to create a cuisine that is clean, plant-forward and visionary. Not as a trend. As a responsibility.

My "Ossi di seppia" draws inspiration from Montale's work, where bones, wandering among the waves and seemingly worthless, symbolize a miserable yet significant existential condition. Like the small things in daily life, they conceal intrinsic value and beauty. By using every part of the cuttlefish, even those considered scraps, I aim to showcase their importance and convey the significance of circular cooking to reduce waste and valorise each ingredient.

I really like being able to eat soup, in a cold version, even in summer or hot days.
The earthy elements are balanced by the different acidities present in the dish; the accompanying drink has the role of recalling the classic Borsch broth while introducing a contrast linked to the ph of the drink itself which makes tasting the dish more fun in the mouth.

Through this dish I express my trajectory and the way I created my personality in the kitchen. It has elements from different countries and experiences that have formed me as a chef. It contains elements from Mexico and Panama, because of my nationality, from Italy by virtue of my descent and gastronomic formation and from Japan after the passion I’ve acquired over Japanese cuisine due to my current job. The fusion of them all create a mix of flavors and techniques that represent me.

As a proud young chef from Mexico, I capture my roots using local ingredients, intertwining cultural traditions with global techniques. Inspired by Oaxaca's rich culinary heritage, my dish showcases our identity, drawing from childhood memories. This creation reflects the vibrant flavors of Oaxaca, honoring our traditions and the essence of my hometown.

As a proud young Mexican chef, I honor my roots through local ingredients and ancestral traditions. Inspired by Oaxaca’s rich culinary heritage, my dish expresses identity, memory, and resilience. It celebrates Latin American unity by highlighting our shared history, vibrant diversity, hard work and the beauty that emerges when our cultures come together through flavor.

Nature selflessly sustains all things. Cuisine should also be all encompassing – discover China’s local sea habitat and combine different techniques. To realize the borderless-ness and all-encompass-ness of cuisine. Just as the sea is vast and embraces all streams. Three pillars as one. With the ocean, time and the sun as the axis, extending their reach.

Begin with a thousand-layer potato prawn dumpling amuse bouche inspired by the traditional renowned dish Longjing Shrimp. For this dish, Zhoushan prawn, known for its quality comparable to Spanish Carabinero prawn, is paired with white konbu flavoured konbucha and fried moss, and is, unintentionally, a representation of local Chinese culture of enjoying morning tea.
 

The idea of the dish is from my hometown, Xinjiang, which is famous for its tasty lamb. The sheep live in the mountains where the sea-buckthorn and pleurotus grow. To bring the scenery of my hometown, I put them together in the plate. Besides, I also want to introduce the diet and cooking culture to more people in the world. We hardly waste any part of an animal as a respect of the nature, and cook each part separately to make the best use of it. Thrift and sustainability are notably important in this age, I wish I could arouse more attention on them.

Every cooking session brings back Jilin’s New Year dishes: guobaorou, braised eggplant and pork skin aspic. With Western, Japanese and French skills, I reinvent these classics.I sous-vide pork loin coated with puffed quinoa, served with umeshu sauce and prickly-pear cold broth. Eggplant comes braised or charcoal-mashed, while pork aspic simmers in bone stock seasoned with soy, chilli and garlic oil.Hometown taste inspires my fusion innovation as a chef.

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...

Nordic Sea is a dish that focuses on sustainable ingredients. This dish reflects my culinary journey and who I am as a chef today. Combining fishing and cooking is fantastic. Something I often did as a child. Many fish species are now threatened by overfishing and pollution. I focus on cod, blue mussels and seaweed. I use MSC-certified cod from the North Sea. Farmed blue mussels that contribute to a better sea environment and seaweed counteract the negative effects of climate change.

I truly believe that the most important element is to have passion for food and cooking. Having passion for what you do will help to drive you to work harder every day. For me, I have a passion for good and clean cooking. When it comes to creating dishes, my culinary philosophy is that everything on the plate has to be “clean”, flavourful, and showcase the beauty of nature

To achieve that, I believe in using the best products ranging from sea, land, and forest to create innovative dishes.

Driven by the understanding that we are the kaitiaki of rivers and oceans, this plate challenges how we care for our resources. It confronts past mistakes like the devastating overfishing of whitebait, which was once used as common garden fertiliser. Jackson has chosen to use abundant Australian ingredients to recreate childhood memories responsibly. This dish utilises zero-waste techniques to blend childhood playfulness with a commitment to ecological preservation.

The main purpose of this dish is to change the misconception that exists in some beef offal's, in this case "sweetbread", considered an exquisite treat in my country, Argentina, however not so pleasant in other cultures. Through childhood flavors I aim to encourage people to experience something different by creating a beautiful dish with colors that pique curiosity to try. And encourage sustainability by utilizing part of the cow that are often considered waste as sweetbread and tendons.

I am pleased to present a new dish that highlights some of the extraordinary ingredient we are fortunate to have in Australia, ingredients that many people may not even be aware of. This culinary creation features various cuts of lamb, each prepared using distinct techniques that enhance their unique flavours and textures. My inspiration for this dish stems from my childhood growing up on my grandfathers farm in rural Queensland.

With this dish I want to see how far I can go using very few elements. One piece of turbot, one circle of sorrel and two small garnishes are arranged almost like a diagram, but the flavours are intense, acidic and slightly fermented. My goal is to cook with restraint: to strip away decoration, focus on structure and texture, and learn to say more by putting less on the plate.

As a young Israeli chef, I believe deeply in the principles of zero waste and seasonal cuisine. These beliefs not only guide my culinary work but also reflect my commitment to sharing and respecting the natural world. My dish, "Pumpkin, Spice & Everything Nice", is a testament to these values,  combining tradition, innovation and responsible cooking.

I’d like to introduce my dish, to express my way of thinking about both cooking and dealing with life outside of gastronomy. the dish depicts a perfect circle of life, forests ( Deer), rivers (crayfish), mountains (cordyceps) all naturally connected and a human (chef) who unitedly combines nature with technology and cares for the environment. Without our healthy and clean approach to life, nature will not survive on its own nowadays, I would like to make people aware of this as much as possible

Raised in Herefordshire, a largely overlooked area producing some of the UK's finest raw ingredients, I have a proudly British identity focussed on celebrating local farmers. I'm working with wild boar from the Forest of Dean due to its local and invasive nature. The dish then boasts the bounty of produce and flavours available from Herefordshire's farmers. Food should be exciting yet approachable, but also sustainable, low-waste and deeply connected to local communities and landscapes.

It is my homage to one of the most iconic animals of a place which I now call home, the Scottish Highlands. I want to express my identity as a chef in this competition by using local and sustainable ingredients, showing respect for the animal by using everything I could. I wanted to showcase the techniques I have learnt in my short time in this industry, with butchery, pastry work and sauce making at the heart of the dish.

A Chef is someone able to forge a connection between times and who can intertwine the strings of time to create something beautiful. Food is central to our sense of identity. The way any given human group eats helps it assert its diversity, hierarchy and organisation, but also, at the same time, both its oneness and the otherness of whoever eats differently. I wanted to create a dish that reflects my background who couldn't think i would love pigeon.

From the Valley to the Shoreline reflects my culinary identity as a chef working in Napa Valley. Through wild California razor clams, local verjuice, coastal seaweeds, and vine shoots, I express the connection between land and sea. This dish celebrates local producers, seasonality, and a product-driven approach rooted in French technique while looking toward a more sustainable future for fine dining.

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.

I believe great cuisine is created through balance: honoring tradition while embracing new influences. My foundation comes from French training in Paris, where I became fascinated by the Japanese influence on modern French cuisine, particularly its emphasis on seasonality, restraint, and clarity of flavor. Through peak-season cherries, plums, and duck, this dish reflects my belief that the most meaningful cooking comes from respecting the season and allowing ingredients to speak for themselves.

When someone asks me, what my favorite thing to cook is, I always have to think. In my career I've worked at all stations in the kitchen and therefore I really like to do all kinds of food. I also wanted my dish to be challenge for me and also to be able to show most of my skills. That's why I created this dish. I can show different cooking methods of the parts of the pigeon, and my skills with doughs and vegetables. The whole dish was inspired by thinking about a pigeon in the forest.

This dish reflects my journey from Taiwan to a multicultural culinary world. Inspired by Taiwan’s tradition of pairing flavors from the sea and the land. It is shaped by Korean respect for fermentation, Italian ingredient-led cooking, and Australian charcoal grilling. Today, I cook to share stories of identity and cultural exchange. In the future, I hope to create tables where food sparks conversation, creates memories, and gives travelers a taste of home.

My cuisine is driven by the desire to challenge the traditional hierarchy of the plate. With this dish, the vegetable becomes the centre of the narrative — not as an alternative to protein, but as the primary expression of flavour. Through different techniques, I explore depth, texture, and emotion. The kingfish takes on a supporting role, bringing salinity and umami without dominating. Every part of the ingredient is valued to create a balanced dialogue between elements.