Rijk Zwaan offers healthy inspiration to students with culinary talent

Prospective chefs have been taking their exams this week at Zadkine College in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Rijk Zwaan has provided a complete range of peppers to the college as healthy ingredients for the dishes the students have to prepare.

“Our aim is to help rising culinary talent discover the enormous diversity of vegetables and the many possibilities that they offer,” says Maarten van der Leeden from Rijk Zwaan. “With all their different colours, tastes, shapes and culinary uses, peppers are a wonderful example. And Rotterdam, as the culinary capital of The Netherlands and host city of the World Food Festival 2013, is the perfect place to bring it all together.”

Ideal taste combination

“Using a ‘magic ingredient box’ and demonstrating various cookery techniques, the 40 students have to prepare a 5-course meal with wine pairings,” continues Maarten. “Peppers are part of the exam. Growing companies Kwekerij de Berk, Westland Peppers and Firma Ton have supplied a total of 15 different types of peppers, and it’s up to the students to find the ideal taste combination.”

“All the dishes prepared by the students will actually be served in a Zadkine restaurant,” explains Maarten. “Expectations are high, because the talented students already spend much of their week working in reputable restaurants, as sous-chefs for instance. This enables them to apply what they learn at college in practice. There has been a really good atmosphere during the exams so far, and the students have been clearly demonstrating that they are true culinary professionals. As soon as their dishes are ready, the students can film or photograph their own creations and upload the images to the Love my Salad Facebook page. That way, they can immediately serve as inspiration for more than 80,000 salad lovers around the world! In addition, the student awarded the highest mark by the exam board at Zadkine College will win a restaurant voucher courtesy of Rijk Zwaan.”