A Report On Cooking and Display Competition 2024-2025
Food is one of the basic necessities of life. Food contains nutrients - substances essential for the growth, repair, maintenance of body tissues and the regulation of vital processes. Nutrients provide the energy to the human body to function, to develop and grow, be active and healthy, to move, play, work, think and learn. The energy in food is measured in units called calories. Food is the main source of nutrition to the body, but many of the foods that we eat do not have any nutritional values. Therefore, we should choose healthy and balanced foods that can provide enough nutritional value for the body. One such healthy food type is Millets. Millets is the sixth most important cereal grain in the world. They are gluten-free grains and hence it can be consumed by everyone. Some types of millets which are used commonly in India are Jowar, Finger Millet, Pearl millet, Foxtail millet, Barnyard millet, Kodo millet and many more.
With the objective to provide the students the experience of cooking, to get acquainted with the method of preparation with the right proportion of food items and to creatively display the prepared food, Dream World School organised the Cooking and Display Competition on 9th November 2024-2025 under the theme ‘Millets’.
The competitors were from the Classes V to IX, divided into two different groups as Uncooked and Cooked dishes (using millets). In total, 133 teams participated in the competition. Students assembled according to their teams at their allotted areas in the school premises at 7:40 a.m. The competition started after offering prayer to Goddess Annapurneshwari with the chanting of slokas by the students. The teams were given 2 hours cooking time to prepare the food items, i.e., from 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Later, students displayed the cooked and uncooked dishes in a creative manner within the given time.
We had Mr Milan Dhara the head chef from Hotel Allum, Mr Suman Biswas, the all-rounder in Hotel Allum Gokulam Park, Mr Pradeep from Food Villa Restaurant, Mr Suresh the manager and Mr Shekar the chef from Hotel Mayura, Ballari, as the Guests cum Judges for the competition. Judges were passionate and fond of trying their hands in experiencing different cuisines.
The assessment of the dishes started from 11:45 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. and was open to the visitors, parents and well-wishers. We appreciate the patience and the aesthetic sense of the judges in tasting every cuisine and judging by their experiences. We hope that the students have gained the blissful skill of preparing food by combining, mixing, and heating ingredients for cooking. The competition was indeed a great learning experience to the students who were exposed to cooking which is a cherishable moment for their lifetime.
