Leah So­rias

T&T's culi­nary artists and mas­ter chefs met un­der one roof at the Trinidad Hilton yes­ter­day for the launch of the Tourism De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny's (TDC) an­nu­al Taste T&T Culi­nary Fes­ti­val.

The event took a dif­fer­ent spin this year un­like pre­vi­ous years where it was held over one week­end in one lo­ca­tion and where em­pha­sis was placed on live demon­stra­tions for pa­trons.

This year, the TDC brought in two well-known in­ter­na­tion­al chefs–Hell's Kitchen sea­son three win­ner Rah­man "Rock" Harp­er and Den­mark's fore­most gas­tro­nom­ic en­tre­pre­neur, Mas­ter Chef Claus Mey­er–to share their skills and knowl­edge with lo­cal chefs.

"This year we are seek­ing to pro­vide a plat­form for de­vel­op­ing the skills of per­sons with­in the in­dus­try, those prepar­ing to em­bark on a culi­nary arts ca­reer and com­mu­ni­ty cooks," said TDC pres­i­dent and di­rec­tor Ernest Lit­tles.

The pro­gramme, ti­tled One Fes­ti­val, Many Flavours, was or­gan­ised by T&T's chef con­sul­tant De­bra Sardinha-Metivi­er. Fol­low­ing the open­ing cer­e­mo­ny, a pan­el, in­clud­ing Mey­ers and Harp­er as well as lo­cal head chefs, were on hand to an­swer ques­tions and share their e Speak­ing to re­porters Harp­er said while he was in love with cui­sine out­side of his cul­ture he want­ed to urge T&T chefs to "re­main true to their own. "Go lo­cal, go sus­tain­able, and al­ways bring it back to what you grew up on," he said.

Mey­er said his aim at the fes­ti­val was to share with Caribbean peo­ple his ex­pe­ri­ence in re­ju­ve­nat­ing a re­gion­al food cul­ture.

"Sev­en years ago Dan­ish food was rat­ed among the five most hor­ri­ble ex­pe­ri­ences in the world," he said.

He said sev­en years lat­er he suc­ceed­ed in cre­at­ing No­ma, which was rat­ed as the world's best restau­rant. He added: "I want to en­cour­age chefs in T&T to do the same. "This is more than just cook­ing a new dish but look­ing at your­self as a chef in a dif­fer­ent way, as a so­cial hero and some­one to be fol­lowed in the fu­ture," he added. The event cul­mi­nat­ed in live demon­stra­tions and dis­cus­sions by var­i­ous chefs as well as Mey­er and Harp­er.