It was a big battle of culinary skills with around 200 participants presenting a wide variety of dishes at The Hindu MetroPlus Cookery Contest conducted at Hotel Novotel on Sunday making the third edition of the event a roaring success.
From college-goers to grandmothers, women of all age groups participated with full gusto, converging at the venue much ahead of the designated time. Innovation and variety were the buzzword as participants presented what they felt was their best dish from the kitchens in the three categories of vegetarian, non-vegetarian and dessert.
At the end of the drama and a closely-contested competition, it was Mahua Banerjee’s innovative preparation grilled chicken in orange segment that won the hearts of the judges and was crowned Vizag’s ‘Cookery Queen’. A practising advocate, Mahua was the first runner-up in first two editions of the contest.
“The presentation, ingredients, the portion and the way she handled the meat was all perfect. Her thought process in addressing the dish was different and the portion was a complete meal,” said K. Subbarayalu, executive chef of Hotel Green Park, who was one of the judges for the contest.
Out of the box ideas like adding a dash of chicken in dessert, chocolate modak, authenticity of cuisine such as the Sawantwadi prawn pulao and healthy dishes like exotic vegan multi-grain quiche were selected by the team of chefs from the top hotels in the city. Each participant presented one dish and also took care to present items with the recipe for the benefit of the judges and audience.
Giving away the prizes to the winners, Joint Collector G. Srujana, who was the chief guest of the event, said: “To know how to cook is a mark of an independent individual, irrespective of the gender. It is a great honour to be around so many independent and empowered women.”
Top three winners
The top three winners in the three categories were: non-vegetarian: Mahua Banerjee, Saira Bhanu, S. Rajya Lakshmi; vegetarian: P. Padmaja, Seema Mohanty, M. Lakshmi; dessert: Mukta Nevatia, Puja Tewari and P. Subhashini.
The event was presented by Vaibhav Jewellers and co-sponsored by Sri Srinivasa Yamaha.
The hospitality partner was Hotel Varun Novotel. Inner Wheel Club was one of the other sponsors while the channel partner was TV 5 and radio partner was 93.5 FM.