Participants in a food show with a judge | photo credit: special arrangement
To celebrate its fourth anniversary, the Telangana Chefs Association organized an event on 5 June at Hotel Trident. Apart from the chefs and other dignitaries, students from various hotel management institutes in the city, culinary professionals, housewives and chefs from Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad. attended the event
As part of the anniversary celebrations, sessions were conducted by several chefs, who spoke on topics such as hotel industry trends, importance of work-life balance, health benefits of millets and how chefs work their magic. There was also a food competition for the participating students. Each college/institute had to display a food item with a theme. Close to 200 students listened attentively at the event as chefs like Shankar Krishnamurthy, founder of Fusion 9, spoke about adopting trending practices in the food and beverage industry. He strongly advocated that the industry should make sincere efforts to improve working conditions and pay scales. “Low pay puts freshers to shame in the industry.”
Students with food display | photo credit: special arrangement
Addressing the students, Manohar Mylavarapu of Trident Hotel said that industry needs them and it is not the other way around. “You don’t need hotels but we need you. Without skilled human resources, an industry like ours cannot function.”
Chef Dharmendra Lamba, President, Telangana Chefs Association said, “Our objective of bringing together the industry, its professionals and those who wish to join has been successfully met and we continue to ensure that we bring more and more opportunities , promote talent and serve excellence on a platter for gastronomy enthusiasts.
He listed a series of events planned by the association for 2023. Events are Bakery Biz, Culinary Carnival, Bajra Utsav, Synergy Event, International Chef’s Day, Culinary League and more. Chef Mandar Sukhtankar, Corporate Chef Windmills Craftworks talk was directed to the students to have a clear focus and find the purpose of their meals. He said, “It is about getting your mind where your hands are. In this age of information social media, it is very easy for anyone to become disillusioned with a profession in the early stages. If you find out the reason for why, it makes your work more interesting and attractive.
The association also honored the unsung heroes of the food industry – teaching staff of culinary institutes. Guest speakers such as Samuel Berthet, director of the Alliance Française emphasized the need to be aware of the food ecosystem and Learning to work with what is easily accessible. “In the food industry, it is important to have chef leaders with a strong sense of awareness of the food ecosystem and expertise. Food is a national treasure of India and through food you can preserve the bio-diversity of the country.”
Chef Vijaya Bhaskaran said, “Our aim is to bring the World Chef Congress to India. Since COVID-19, we have been doing a lot of online events and culinary competitions. Chefs today have come a long way from being background boys to being at the forefront of hotels.”
Students with food display | photo credit: special arrangement
Taking a different route in the discussion of food and industry, Chef Thimma Reddy talks about food trends with indicators in geopolitics – stable and unstable governments determine the future of food. He also stressed on the need to study ecology, environment and co-existence of living beings and global warming. “The work of a futurologist is “future study”, which involves in-depth research to develop useful foresights about what is likely, possible and better for organizations, people and the planet, based on current trends and likely events,” he said. is included.”