Craft Guild of Chefs Graduate Awards announces 16 finalists

Sixteen chefs have been given the chance to compete in the Craft Guild of Chef’s Graduate Award in its 20th anniversary year.

The chefs completed a series of skills tests, paper exams and challenges at Sheffield College and West Herts College in Watford in a bid to take one of the places in the final exam in September.

The chefs who will complete in the kitchen exam are:

• Liam Balmer, Lucknam Park
• Harry Donnelly, the RAF Club
• Alex Doyle, Marcus Belgravia
• Cameron Jones, the Waterside Inn
• Benjamin Mabley, Hartwell House Hotel & Spa
• Jonathan Smith, Gravetye Manor
• Billy Etheridge, Belmond Le Manoir Aux Quat'Saisons
• Sam Dixon, Northcote
• Chloe Williamson, Prestwold Hall

And seven chefs will sit the pastry exam:

• Amelia Klyta, Royal Yacht Britannia
• Sanjam Nagpal, the Dorchester
• Ana Catarina Nogueira De Melo, Intercontinental Park Lane
• Liberty Noke, Monkey Island Estate
• Miles Slater, Pennyhill Park Hotel and Spa
• Hoi Yan Tam, Browns hotel
• Katrina Atienza, University of West London

The kitchen chefs undertook a starter challenge where they had to create a dish using products from the Redefine Meat range, one of the sponsors for this year, and the pastry chefs were tasked with making chocolate bars, choux a la crème, a custard tart and decorated biscuits with Lakeland Dairies products.

Steve Munkley, vice-president of the Craft Guild of Chefs and founder of the Graduate Awards said: “It was a fantastic semi-final and all the chefs worked extremely hard. Now we have our impressive list of finalists, we look forward to our mentoring trip in a few weeks’ time where we’ll be exploring the culinary delights of Surrey. This provides the young chefs with a memorable opportunity which will not only allow them to develop their skills, but they will make some fantastic new connections.

"We’re pulling out all the stops to ensure we celebrate our 20th anniversary in style and will be supporting these 16 chefs over the coming weeks in their bid to achieve that all important pass mark in September.”