Seoul Cooking Contest for Korean Food Successfully Held
By Kim Hyun-cheol
Staff Reporter
A huge cookery hall at the Human Resources Development Services Center in western Seoul was full of sizzling heat and tall-capped chefs Tuesday afternoon, as the nation's most acclaimed experts on Korean food bid for spots to represent the country in an upcoming international cooking competition.
A total of 41 teams, along with eight invited exhibition groups, matched their skills and expertise in Korean cuisine or ``hansik,'' at the fourth and last regional contest for the upcoming World Korean Food Competition and Festival.
Some of the nation's top experts of traditional and contemporary Korean food took part in the contest, in which they were required to prepare a full-course meal within three hours.
Participants included chefs from Seoul and metropolitan-based hotels such as Mayfield, Westin Chosun, JW Marriott Hotel, Renaissance Seoul and Grand Ambassador. Cooks from several local food and cooking franchises also vied with entries of creative and authentic hansik menus.
A pair of cooking professors became the winners in the most professional categories for adult competitors. Professors Choi Young-ho and Kim Hee-yeon of Myeongji Technical College won the qualification with a nine-course table-d'hote comprising specialties from all of the country's provincial regions, as well as several royal items.
"We tried to make every element of our entry as authentic as possible at the regional qualification, but it'll be a totally new composition at the global competition," Choi said.
"Now we will work on how to give them a global touch and make a different composition of dishes to make all the courses flow like storytelling that will make the table a different eating experience."
The Korean delegation for the world competition has been selected through four regional qualifications, including the contest in Seoul, in three different age categories.
In the adult category, Grand Ambassador Hotel chefs Cho Gwan-haeng and Jung Won-hee won in the Sunday's southwestern competition with a dish of grilled lamb chops with Korean-style chili sauce.
The pair of Kim Myung-bok and Kim Woo-young of Foseca, a local catering firm, won the southeastern qualification Saturday with a meal highlighted with chicken abalone soup.
At Monday's qualification in the central region, sisters Seo Soo-jung and Soo-mi topped all other contenders with their ``cheongsachorong.'' Named after a Korean traditional-style silk-lantern, the dish attracted judges with stunning visual appeal in a presentation of chopped ``bulgogi,'' a famous Korean barbecue dish, stuffed into a pumpkin flower.
Judges of the contest highly praised the overall quality of entries on the day. Peruvian Amb. to Seoul Marcela Lopez Bravo, a co-head judge with The Korea Times President-Publisher Park Moo-jong, said she was deeply impressed with tastes and visual appearances of all the presented dishes.
``They all have a great combination and it was very striking to me,'' Bravo said. ``One part was genuinely traditional and the other had a modernized touch using Western-style sauces and ingredients. The contrast was so impressive.''
A committed connoisseur of various cuisines, the envoy said efforts of the Korean government to globalize its culinary culture will pay off in the end.
``The (Korean) government tries very hard to give a good image to Korean food. Its officials are doing it with a clear objective and I respect their efforts,'' the envoy said.
Bravo also suggested Seoul pay more attention to Korean restaurants overseas, so more foreign locals can have the chance to experience Korean food. Currently there are four Korean restaurants in Lima, the Peruvian capital, and hansik is gaining popularity in the Latin American country, she added.
Special invitees also presented their own unique creations at the competition. Two beauty pageant winners Lee Seul-gi and Choi Ji-hee, the promotion ambassadors of the event, cooked dishes including kimchi fried rice and fish dumplings.
``We learned to cook these dishes for a whole week, but still feel very nervous to cook with professional competitors here," said Lee Seul-gi, the second runner-up at this year's Miss Korea Pageant.
Several local housewives from multi-cultural homes also shared their own authentic and fusion hansik dishes. Most of them said the natural and healthy characteristics of Korean cuisine will lead the way with its globalization.
Saltanat Aitmuratova, a 30-year-old from Uzbekistan, said she likes the variety of ingredients in Korean dishes. The housewife, who has been living in Gunsan, North Jeolla Province for nine years, presented spicy chicken stew and a couple of more Korean dishes along with traditional Uzbek-style fried rice.
Lee Yoo-jung, a naturalized Vietnamese from Anyang, Gyeonggi Province, said Korean food can be ``further developed through sharing more culture with other Asian cuisines upon their similar cultural ground.''
Defectors from North Korea also unveiled some home specialties such as ``sundae,'' or Korean-style blood sausages, from Hamgyeong Province. ``I've been to several other countries so far, but no dishes are cooked with elaboration and sophisticated efforts as Korean ones,'' said Yoo Jung-hee.
Hosted jointly by The Hankook Ilbo, Sports Hankook, Koreatimes.com and The Korea Times, the international event is scheduled from Sept. 26 through Oct. 5 at the Culinary Institute of Art in New York. Winners of the 30 million won ($24,300) competition will join the Korean Day Parade in the city, and work for the next year as special envoys promoting Korean cuisine across the globe.
