APPRENTICE OF THE YEAR
Each year, the ICE teachers, Directors and staff choose 10 finalists from a very talented array of ICE 3rd Year Apprentices.
The competition is judged by three of the best known and critically acclaimed chefs in Brisbane each year and 20 VIP diners are invited to the Coorparoo Campus to ‘taste test’ the final dishes. All food for the ‘cook-off’ is donated by our ICE industry sponsors.
The standard gets better and better each year and along with us at ICE and the industry judges, we are all blown away by the food and presentation produced. The winner is announced at our Graduation Party and Awards Night at our Coorparoo Campus at the end of the ICE school year.
COMPETITIONS
Throughout the year many ICE students are encouraged to compete in a variety of competitions such as Golden Chef’s Hat , Chaine de Rotisseurs, Proud to be a Chef and the other competitions. The most prestigious competition though, is still our ‘ICE Apprentice Chef of the Year’, which has seen 5 winners so far, since it all began in 2014 with the first winner being Nathan Testa.
The winner in 2015 was Anthony Nguyen, who won a trip to stage at the ‘Waldorf Astoria Hotel’ in New York City for 2 weeks. Followed in 2016 by Jaala Croft (the first female to win the much coveted award), who staged at the Best Restaurant in the World: ‘Eleven Madison Park’ also in NYC for two weeks. Nic Raffo was our 2017 winner, followed by Craig Brunton in 2018 and last year’s winner Eugene McCarthy in 2019, all of whom also travelled to NYC to stage and work in ‘Eleven Madison Park’. They also staged at ‘NoMad Hotel’, Runner and Stone Bakery (voted the number 1 bakery in NYC) and dined at Cosme (World’s Best Mexican Restaurant outside of Mexico) and Per Se (3 Michelin Star restaurant owned by America’s highest awarded and greatest chef, Thomas Keller). Who knows who this year’s winner might be? All ICE students work above and beyond to be selected for this coveted completion each year and the standard seems to be getter better and better…
