Chris Owen to compete for senior National Chef of Wales title

Chris Owen from the Castle Hotel, Conwy, is seeking to become the second Welsh chef ever to win both the junior and senior National Chef of Wales titles.

Junior champion in 2007, Owen won the North Wales heat of the National Chef of Wales contest at Deeside College, Connah's Quay in November. "It would be an amazing feeling to win both titles and I'll be giving it my best shot," he said.

Joining him in the final at the Welsh International Culinary Championships at Coleg Llandrillo Cymru, Rhos on Sea on Tuesday, February 16 is rising star Luke Thomas, a 16-year-old pupil of Connah's Quay High School, South Wales champion Iain Sampson, 42, from Peterstone Court Country House Restaurant and Spa, Llanhamlach, Brecon and Jim Hamilton, 35, from Fairyhill Hotel, Reynoldston, Gower, Swansea.

The winner of the contest, which is sponsored jointly by the Welsh Assembly Government and Hybu Cig Cymru / Meat Promotion Wales, will receive £2,000 prize money, a trophy and the coveted National Chef of Wales title, while the runner up will go home with £1,000.

The finalists face the challenge of devising and cooking a menu for a four-course dinner for four in three hours from a mystery black box of ingredients, which they will see only the night before the contest. The ingredients will include some Wales True Taste award winning products.

The contest is organised by the Welsh Culinary Association, whose chairman Peter Jackson, co-owner of Hotel Maes-y-Neuadd, Talsarnau, Harlech.

Words: Maria Bracken

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