SriLankan Catering among the best at Culinary Art

SriLankan Catering Services won 23 medals at the Culinary Art, Sri Lanka’s foremost hospitality industry competition, proving that it is more than capable of competing among the best in the business.

SriLankan Catering, the inflight catering arm of the National Carrier, was placed among the top ten of companies at Culinary Art, winning six Gold, six Silver, and 11 Bronze medals. The competition at the BMICH in Colombo drew 1,400 participants, mainly from Sri Lanka’s hotel industry. It even had small teams from the Maldives, India, and Australia.

Dilip Nijhawan, CEO of SriLankan Catering, said: “It is a considerable achievement as an inflight catering company to distinguish itself and win such a high tally of medals in a hotel-oriented competition.”

SriLankan Catering has won a number of impressive global and local accolades recently. These include two Silver Medals and a Bronze Medal at the recent Hong Kong International Culinary Classic; and a Mercury Award from the International Flight Catering Association. At the last Culinary Art in 2005, SriLankan Catering won 11 medals.

Sudhish Pande, Production Manager at SriLankan Catering, said: “This performance is all the more impressive because our team competed mainly in Live Cooking events, where they prepared dishes within a limited time in front of an international panel of judges, rather than in static displays.”

SriLankan Catering is an ISO 9001:2000 certified company that provides inflight catering for airlines that fly through Colombo, and also operates restaurants at Bandaranaike International Airport. The company last year commissioned a state-of-the-art Flight Kitchen at an investment of USD 25 million, and presently produces an average of more than 13,500 meals per day.

Allan Orreal, the company’s Executive Chef, said: “We competed right alongside the best names in the country’s hospitality industry and proved that we are as good as any five-star hotel. We had a mix of senior staff down to trainees in the team.”

SriLankan Catering’s team even won medals in unusual areas, most notably the Tea Service competition, where it won a Silver overall but was presented a Gold medal for Innovation by the judges for its unusual Japanese Tea Presentation.

“It is not easy for an airline caterer to send a large team to compete in culinary events, as we must maintain our 24-hour production of meals for flights at the airport. But SriLankan Catering encourages participation in such competitions in order to provide exposure for our team,” said Allan Orreal.

SriLankan Airlines has many accolades to its credit, recently being awarded the prestigious Imperial Mark, a global accolade of excellence in recognition of its exceptional levels of service and quality. SriLankan Airlines is the only airline in Asia to be honoured with this award.

** An overview of the celebrated SriLankan Airlines Staff who were proclaimed winners at the Culinary Art 2007.

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