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HORNBILL Master Chef, a cooking competition on indigenous Naga cuisine will be making its debut into the annual Hornbill Festival this year at The Naga Heraitage Complex, Kisama on December 2-9 starting from 11 am to 2 pm. The competition will be a live cooking event where the contestants will prepare their best offerings of an array of Naga cuisine. This will come as an opportunity for those who love to cook, to hone their culinary skills by putting them to test in a competitive set-up. Interestingly, any visitor at the Hornbill Festival can get to taste the food and judge the skills of the contestants, providing they are amongst the first 20 persons present at the event venue. Each chef will be preparing 20 plates which will be made available for the audience to taste on a ‘first come first serve’ basis.
According to Synergy Group Enterprise (SGE) members, the organizers of the Hornbill Master Chef competition, Naga indigenous food is the real story of the Naga people- ingrained in the variety of local herbs, spices and ingredients and the process of preparation tells of the rich and unique cultural heritage of the Naga tribes and their intimate association with their beautiful land, mountains and forests for generations.
Organizers say the event aspires to showcase the varied delicacies of the different Naga tribes during the festival by way of presenting Naga indigenous cuisines of high quality, aiming to reach the level of international standards.
Speaking to media persons on Friday at Seasons Café, Kohima, SGE member AlezoKense said that the Hornbill Master Chef, as a follow up of the recently concluded Naga Chef show, will see contenders of the Naga Chef Season One battling out their culinary skills once again on a different competition format where their skills will be judged by the audience. He said that the top Naga Chef contenders have gone through a gruelling selection process being assessed of their knowledge, innovation skills, ability to handle pressure and teamwork.
He said the Hornbill Master Chef event intends to establish a platform for talented Naga chefs who specialize in different Naga cuisine and also have the potential to promote indigenous Naga food globally.
The winner of Hornbill Master Chef 2013 will walk away with a prize money of Rs.2 lakhs. Other prizes will be given out everyday for the “Dish of the Day” winners. The show’s pantry will be managed by Organic Nagaland and Hotel Management students from The Global Open University, Nagaland will be assisting the chefs during the competition. The event is supported by the state government and local English dailies The Morung Express and Eastern Mirror are the media partners.