S.Pellegrino Young Chef 2015: and winners are...

Mark Moriarty, the young chef representing the UK-Ireland at the S.Pellegrino Young Chef competition has been awarded the title of S.Pellegrino Young Chef of the year 2015.

The young Irish chef managed to fend off competition from 19 other internationally selected young chefs in a live event in front of a packed audience in Milan, Italy on Friday 26th July. Hereunder you can watch the footage of the event.

Mark’s creative take on a bold vegetarian dish featured Celeriac baked in barley and fermented hay, cured and smoked Celeriac. Speaking after the award, the victorious young chef spoke of his hopes for the future and his desire to put his home country of Ireland in the culinary spotlight, and as well as letting the world know that Ireland has more to offer than the potato!

Both the Best Young Chef/Designer Couple award and the Best Couple Web award went to the Latin American duo, chef Maria José Jordan and fashion designer Paula Cademartori. The jubilant winners were evidently overcome at winning both awards and a shocked Jordan claimed that all the votes must have come from friends and family. 

The Best Designer award went to Xiao Li from China for her simple designs inspired by the Tomato dish of young chef Zhu Wenyuan. In a humble acceptance speech Xiao Li acknowledged that she had learnt a lot about the strong relationship between food and fashion as a result of the competition.