A school catering manager from Rugby is to appear on The One Show this Wednesday (6th March) the day before she competes to win the title of national ‘School Chef of the Year’!Tanya Malone, who...
A school catering manager from Rugby is to appear on The One Show this Wednesday (6th March) the day before she competes to win the title of national ‘School Chef of the Year’!
Tanya Malone, who works for Warwickshire-based school catering company Educaterers and is Site Catering Manager at Rugby Free Secondary School, has already won the title of West Midlands ‘School Chef of the Year’ for two years running in the annual competition run by LACA (Lead Association for Catering in Education).
Tanya and the nine other regional winners, plus two ‘wild cards’, will appear on The One Show ahead of the national grand final, which will be held at Stratford-upon-Avon College on Thursday (7th March).
Tanya will be interviewed about the whole competition experience, as a previous national finalist, and will appear alongside MasterChef judges Gregg Wallace and John Torode.
The Educaterers’ chef won over judges of the West Midlands final with a menu that put a ‘twist’ on the traditional school lunch.
Her ‘Twist of Fish’ main course saw Tanya take the concept of a traditional school dessert – apple crumble – and transform it into a savoury fish crumble served with spaghetti potatoes, courgettes and carrot puree.
Her winning dessert – ‘Twist of Pizza’ – took a school dinner favourite (pizza) and served it up as a sweet option, topped with fruits and crushed meringue and served with a lime jelly wedge.
The title of LACA School Chef of the Year is the most prestigious that any school chef across the UK can hold.
Educaterers have provided meals to Rugby Free Secondary School since it opened in September 2016. They provide over 120,000 school meals every week to over 200 schools across Warwickshire, Birmingham and Oxfordshire.
The company believes strongly in developing its catering teams’ expertise and has supported Tanya’s participation in the competition.
Terry Tredget, Director of Educaterers, said: “LACA School Chef of the Year is the prize that all school caterers want to win and we are so pleased that Tanya has got through to the national final again this year after exciting the regional judges with her innovative twist on a traditional school menu.
“Our staff are our greatest strength and it would be wonderful to see an Educaterers caterer bring home that trophy, so we will all be keeping our fingers crossed for Thursday!”
For more information on Educaterers, visit www.educaterers.co.uk.