Last April, Danish René Redzepi’s Noma won Best Restaurant in the World. All eyes are now on inventive Nordic cuisine, and this trend is not going away anytime soon. This year’s top three winners of the international Bocuse d’Or competition, one of the world’s most prestigious cuisine contests, are all from Scandinavia!
1. Danish chef Rasmus Kofoed (1974) won the gold trophy, which can now accompany the silver- and bronze ones he has already got. Aged 36, Rasmus Kofoed co-owns Michelin star restaurant Geranium in Copenhagen, with partner & chef Søren Ledet. He is the first person to participate in the competition three times. “I use a lot of products from nature, such as herbs, flowers, mushrooms and berries. I spent almost a thousand hours to get ready for this competition. I don’t have a coach, but I worked with a group of great chefs who tasted my food and shared their opinion.” – Rasmus Kofoed
2. Swede Tommy Myllymäki (1978) was named Chef of the Year in 2007 in Sweden. He took part into the Bocuse d’Or Europe last summer, and he won the silver medal at the latest international Bocuse d’Or. He owns the Cleverness Colony in Jonkoping and Julita Inn in Julita, Sweden. He is also a partner in Matkomfort.
3. The bronze medal was handed to Gunnar Hvarnes (1977), a Norwegian chef and culinary consultant at the Gastronomisk Institutt in Stavanger. As the winner of Norway’s “chef of the year” in 2009, Hvarnes qualified as the Norwegian Bocuse d’Or Europe delegate. In the Bocuse d’Or Europe final in Geneva in June 2010, Hvarnes won the silver medal behind Rasmus Koefoed, qualifying for the Bocuse d’Or final this January.
The competition is often referred to as the culinary equivalent of the Olympic games. For 5h35, 24 young talented chefs from 24 countries competes for a medal. The jury was composed of 24 reknowned chefs representing each participating country.
The international Bocuse d’Or competition took place on 25-26 January in Lyon, France.
Photos: SIRHA 2011
