Two Teams Wow The Rest @ Cold Display

The Swedes and Canadians have surged ahead of the pack winning three gold medals each for their cold display table, which was on show today in halls 2 and 3 of the Erfurt Messe.
With a compact, uniform presentation highlighted by top-down lighting, lush green landscaping in the centre, green showplates underneath white serving dishes, the overall impression that the Swedish tean achieved with both judges and visitors was clean, sharp and simply, "wow!" The Canadians with their refined, contemporary food presentation, perfect-sized portions. In fact, both tables, according to a number of comments, exemplified the best there is to offer in a culinary art exhibition as international as this one.

The United States national team has also done very well, with two silver and one gold for their overnight efforts. Unfortunately they were just several points shy of the top two scorers.

Judge Jakob Magnusson who is in charge of scoring national team cold displays, shared his perspective of what is important in this category. "We're not scoring so much on the taste, but the appearance of the food, whether the vegetables are cut right, if the glazing is good, whether the combination is balanced between the meat, fish, vegetables and other ingredients. We look for clean lines, good portions on the plate - if you're preparing a three-course menu, the starter definitely has to be smaller than the main course, and the dessert has to fit. Each table also has a theme, but the theme does not carry a very heavy score."

Still, the exquisite themes carried a large part of the overall impression for everybody else who came to admire the culinary art exhibition. Examples of what the teams put out: Sweden's dishes were all composed of organic produce, while Canada's desserts followed an Indian cultural theme, featuring small drums. The Australians brought their famous surf to the Messe Hall with an icy cool blue set up, wave and surfer sculptures and lots of seafood medleys. The Germans presented a tall Romanesque 'garden of the gods' buffet table with pedestal columns bearing their culinary creations, lush green vegetation and marble figuring on a marble base.

Each national team (represented by their team managers) is afforded some audience time with their judges, to explain / defend their presentation concepts and listen to juror feedback. This is the only means of understanding the medals that are awarded at the end of each day. Point scores (which are cumulative) are as yet unavailable.

Expect the Unexpected

The Australians were in a bit of a patch when their display plates did not arrive at the exhibition hall in time for their cold display today. Luckily the Singaporean team, who had presented the day before, consented to lend their plates to save the day. All turns out well in the name of the sport when hands of friendship are extended across borders - the Australians earned one gold and two bronze medals for their beautiful display.

Youths Prove Their Metal

Junior Teams from Ireland, Luxembourg, Poland and Sweden working in Hall 2 were under pressure to perform twice, first as a team in the hot kitchen and then in individual tests of basic skills. Their counterparts from the UK, Portugal, the Czech Republic and Wales had earned three silvers and one gold respectively the day before, adding on the pressure. As intense as the pressure gets, however, it seems some team youthful members are still able to relax and entertain audiences peering at them like zoo exhibits from behind glass windows. A particularly relaxed member of the Swiss team who competed on Sunday was observed to have danced around with an abnormally large peppermill while grinning cheekily at his fans through the window!

WACS Congress 2006

Murray Dick, director of the 32nd WACS world congress in Auckland New Zealand (12 - 16 March 2006), on the upcoming congress in New Zealand:

"We're very close to getting all our sponsorships together, and we're also working on preparing online registration to be ready by March 2005, so between now and December we will be putting all that together. After that we can set the registration fee - we're looking at about 750 €, but if we can tighten up on that through sponsorship, we can reduce it," he said in a quick interview.

The average attendances at the biennial congresses vary between 300 and 650, but organizers are hoping to attract about 800 delegates in 2006. "We're a long destination to get to from most parts of the world - you don't pass through New Zealand on every other business trip like some destinations in Europe. Some people may even have to land in Australia and get a connecting flight, so our biggest concern is to ensure people book early and get their flights settled early," he elaborated.