David Mulcahy on National Chef of the Year 2014

National Chef of the Year 2014 is open for entries. and you could win  £15,000 worth of prizes and join a list of winners including Gordon Ramsay, David Everitt-Matthias, Mark Sargeant, Steve Love, Simon Hulstone, Alyn Williams and Hayden Groves.

• Related: David Mulcahy, Culinary Director, Sodexo

It is one of the most respected chef competitions in the industry and the Staff Canteen spoke to vice president of the Craft Guild of Chefs and competition organiser, David Mulcahy to get the low-down on this year’s competition. 

What’s does the competition have in store for us this year?

This year’s competition is already open for entries; again there are three categories – Asian/oriental, modern British/European, and rest of the world in order to encourage people from all over the industry to have a go. Forty competitors from the paper entries will go through to the semi-finals in June which will be in four heats of ten competitors, one of which will be a dedicated heat for the Asian/oriental and rest of the world categories.

The London heats this year are moving to the Cordon Bleu Cookery School which will all take place on one day with the announcement of the eight finalists that evening, as well as those for Young National Chef of the Year. On 19th September we’ll have a mentors’ day which will be run almost as a kind of farmers’ market with all the ingredients that will be available to the competitors for the final and where the suppliers will be able to talk directly to the competitors. Finalists then have about a week to order their ingredients which they’ll be given on the morning of the final, which will be 7th October at the Restaurant Show.   

Is there anything new to the competition this year?

We’ve made the entry form simpler with things to concentrate on that we tell the competitor like seasonality, provenance, balance and practicality. We’ve also made it mandatory to include a photo of the dish with the recipe this year, so that should make it easier for the judges to visualise what the person is actually trying to achieve. Also working with Cordon Bleu is something we’re very proud of. They don’t normally open their doors to events like this. It’s state of the art and I think the competitors are going to love it. We’ve also got Clare Smyth as co-chairman this year along with Phil Howard who is chairman again. The idea is that she will take on the chairmanship next year.   

What advice would you give to potential competitors?

The first thing is planning. A lot of chefs fall down when the menus they submit in writing are poorly thought out. It needs to be clear and succinct so that the judge, who doesn’t know who they are or what their capabilities are, can form a clear idea of the dish. I would say get someone else to read it and read it thoroughly for everything from typos to missing parts and assumptions. If you’re successful getting through then it’s a case of taking quality time out to practice, and quality time doesn’t mean half eleven at night after a double shift.

Also practise with the least amount of equipment possible so you’re reflecting what’s in a competition kitchen. The other

thing is to produce dishes that should ideally go onto menus and be sold because you do want these dishes to be realistically good meals that customers would want to eat. If you think of the judge as a customer you can’t go far wrong. The overall secret is to produce three balanced dishes rather than a weak dish and two strong dishes or one strong dish and two weak dishes. And ultimately try and enjoy the experience and try to learn something out of it. The whole community around the competition including the judges have all got the competitors’ best interests at heart and they want people to enjoy it, learn from it and use it as a stepping stone to progress in their career.   

What would you say to someone thinking of applying but possibly worried that the competition is too big for them?

I would say there’s nothing there to stop you from entering or succeeding. I f you produce good food and you’re passionate about that in your day-to-day life, all you’re doing is showing people that but in a different environment, so just cook really well and go for it.  

To enter this year's National Chef of the Year competition simply submit a paper entry for judging to clair.bowman@wrbm.com by Friday 11 April where a shortlist of 40 chefs will be selected.

• Read more about the National Chef of the Year 2014 here