last weekend saw the Hotelympia competition at ExCel in London. Hotelympia is a major hospitality show that happens every two years and encompasses the Salon Culinaire de Londres which is a collection of static and live competitions. On Sunday I was competiting in my first senior class at my first Hotelympia. Having worked frantically on my tea pastries the week before at work which included a Coffee and chocolate pyramid, Passionfruit and Strawberry charlotte, cherry and chocolate linzer tart and pistachio choux bun amonst others, I was extremeley pleased with my Silver medal position.

Getting good constructive feedback from the judges was excellent and I will certainly learn from this for next year's Hospitality competition at the NEC. On Monday and Tuesday I was privilidged enough to be asked to judge similar competitions both in junior and senior classes. I thourghly enjoyed the judging experience as I learned lots of new skills which will hopefully also help me for competiting. On the Monday I also did a demonstration along side Yolande (me mentor) and Alistair Birt, who alongside Yolande, I helped train for the 2009 WorldSkills in Calgary (which I was also at in a UK Ambassadorial role to the Premiere Experience). He also won a Medallion of Excellence and has become a great friend. Demonstarting different chocolate techniques included a "Ready, Steady Cook" style competition which saw both me and Alistair make a centre piece out of chocolate against the clock. A great afternoon and well received by the audience. On the Tuesday I judged the UKSkills "Search for A Star" competition which is the first heat of the competitior shortlisting process for the next WorldSkills competition in London in October 2011. All the competitors did extremely well and I  am looking forward to seeing them compete at the National final in April.

Bachmanns were very proud and pleased of my achievements at Hotelympia and so it's been back to work with preparations in hand for Easter with eggs coming out of all our ears ready to hit our shelves for Mothers Day.

Last night saw the official opening ceremony of WorldSkills Calgary 2009 and what a show they put on for us and the 51 participating countries!  Dancers, singers, extreme motorcyclists, fireworks, and a Kiss tribute band amongst other acts highlighted Calgary’s excitement at  holding the 40 ^th WorldSkills Competition.  However, the most spectacular part of the ceremony was when Team UK walked on stage with the Union Jack waving in the air, cheered on by an extremely noisy army of UK supporters – a very proud moment for us all. 

Today saw day 1 of the competition kick off with a huge number of school children and members of the community viewing the competition.  With the added number of people in the halls and the increasing temperatures the atmosphere is certainly very hot, and although at times a little draining, seeing the members of Team UK do their thing certainly re-energises you as they are all completely ‘in the zone’ and are flying through their test pieces doing the nation proud!

Tonight saw UK Skills host a reception in the main grandstand to celebrate the next competition: WorldSkills London 2011.  Featuring speeches from UK Skills Minister, Kevin Brennan MP, Chris Humphries CBE, the night saw all guests celebrate London as the next host nation to WorldSkills, only a year before London hosts the next Olympics.    

By the end of tomorrow, we’ll be half way through the competition and all the test pieces will have begun to take shape. 

http://worldskillsteamuk.org/news/galleries/a1_ClosingCeremony.html?uri=/news/galleries/a1_CompetitionDay3.html#