Graduates celebrate with London dinner
Graduates of Bournemouth & Poole College's specialised chefs' course have celebrated their achievement by cooking dinner for their families and sponsors in the Butchers' Hall in the City of London.
The 12 successful students on the Academy of Culinary Arts-sponsored course cooked a five-course dinner supported by their chef de cuisine from the college, David Boland, and the executive chef of Butchers' Hall, Martin Davies.
The menu comprised a demi-tasse of iced plum tomato consommé with aromatic infusions, Champagne of fillet of sole with summer salad crudités, slow-roasted rib-eye of Scottish beef with a spicy Burgundy jus, a selection of cheeses (Wigmore, Cooleeney and Ardrahan) and millefeuilles of fresh strawberries and pistachio crème légère.
Throughout their three-year course each graduate chef worked with a sponsor from the academy between stints at college. The course ended with a six-hour practical examination, for which they were awarded a Diploma in Professional Cookery.
The successful students and their sponsor chefs were: Nick Atkins (Pierre Chevillard, Chewton Glen, New Milton, Hampshire); Daniel Cooke (Richard Shepherd, Langan's Brasserie, London); Jamie Dobbin (John Williams, Claridge's, London); Robert Goodman (John McManus, Ashdown Park hotel, Forest Row, East Sussex); Kierron John Hales (Stephen Goodlad, Restaurant Associates/120 Fleet Street, London); Nikki Lewis (Richard Shepherd, Langan's Brasserie); Patrick Maidment (Giles Thompson, the Ritz, London); Lisa Norvill (Richard Shepherd, Shepherd's, London); Nicholas Parnell (Alan Cutler, Dormy House hotel, Broadway, Worcestershire); Tom Pickfird (Chris Suter, Bishopstrow House, Warminster, Wiltshire); Tom Schafheitle (Michel Bourdin, the Connaught, London); Toby Sharple (Richard Shepherd, Langan's Coq d'Or, London).
