The cream of Australia’s young hospitality and foodservice industry students were in the spotlight at this year’s Worldskills Australia competition.
The winners now have the chance to possibly be selected to go on to compete as part of the “Skillaroos” team against apprentices from around the world at the international Worldskills competition to be held in London next year.
The competition sees students across more than 35 categories of skills. In the foodservice and hospitality area these include Cooking, Restaurant Service, Retail Bakery. As well, the event includes the VET in Schools competition in categories including Commercial Cookery, and Food and Beverage.Observatory Hotel apprentice chef Joseph Astorga, who received the gold medal in Cookery, said the secret to his success had been an intensive training program. The young chef, a student at Ryde College, said he had learned a lot during the intensive training in the lead up to the competition.
“I’ve learned heaps that I wouldn’t have learned otherwise,” Astorga said. “[The competition] was a really high standard but we did so much training in preparation for it.”
He said he hopes Worldskills will help prepare him for his career ahead. “I really want to work in a Michelin star restaurant, that’s my ultimate goal as a chef,” Astorga said.
“If I can take the competition to an international level then hopefully I can take my career to an international level as well.”
The other medal winners in the hospitality/foodservice categories were:
Worldskills Australia 2010
Cooking
Gold—Joseph Astorga (The Observatory Hotel/TAFE NSW Northern Sydney Institute, Ryde)
Silver—Monique Goodworth (Noahs restaurant/TAFE NSW New England Institute, Tamworth).
Bronze—Lorcan Kan (Charcoal Lane restaurant/Box Hill Institute, Elgar)
Restaurant Service
Gold—Kate Crocker (TAFE NSW Northern Sydney Institute, Ryde)
Silver—Samantha Butt (Crowne Plaza Norwest/TAFE NSW Western Sydney Institute, The Hills college
Bronze—Michael Bascetta (Bella Vedere/Swinburne Institute, Lilydale)
Retail Baking
Gold—Matthew Thorpe (Elbio All About Sweets/TAFE SA)
Silver—Matthew Mitchell (Bakers Delight Swan View/Polytechnic West, Bentley Campus)
Bronze—Robert Brigham (Bakers Delight/TAFE NSW Illawarra Institute, Wollongong)
VET in Schools
Commercial Cookery
Gold—Meredith Nightingale (Shellharbour Anglican College)
Silver—Lucinda Vivers (Oxley High School)
Bronze—Nathan Sandy (Rydges Canberra/Canberra Institute of Technology, Reid)
Food and beverage
Gold—Carina Serray (Wollongon High School)
Silver—Anthony Graham (Launceston College, Launceston)
Bronze—Emma Fedele (Hamilton Senior High School)