Gavin Kellett wins Cordon Vert Chef of the Future 2014 award
The Vegetarian Society has announced Gavin Kellett, head chef at the Manor House Conference Centre in Godalming, as its Chef of the Future 2014.
In its sixth year, the national competition challenged all chefs and cooks to create a three-course menu that was entirely vegetarian, with the five finalists invited to prepare their menus in a three-hour cook-off at the Cordon Vert cookery school in Manchester.
The competition is organised by the Vegetarian Society's cookery school, Cordon Vert.
Kellett's menu included crispy hearts of pam with mushroom duxelles, aubergine chutney and Brighton blue cheese; nettle pasta with asparagus, garlic and liquid nettle spheres; and warm carrot cake with cream cheese sorbet and crystallised walnuts.
He has now won a fully-funded place on the Cordon Very Professional Diploma training week, worth £1,600.
He said: "I'm really glad to get the opportunity to showcase my skills and demonstrate how creative, tasty and exciting vegetarian menus can be. I'm also happy that a lot of my ingredients were foraged and very much reflected my own style."
The other finalists included Jonathon Tite from Sheffield, Olivia West from Oxford, Ryan Martin from Gleneagles and Sam Longthorn from Knutsford.
The judges were Alex Connell, principal tutor at the Cordon Vert; owner of Bistro 1847 Damien Davenport; chef at Altrincham hotel Cresta Court Robert Higginson, and Gary Ashley, private chef and Chef of the Future winner 2012 and 2013.
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