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News
Rioja DOC launches tapas talent contest
The Rioja regulatory board has teamed up with the Basque Culinary Center to launch an international Rioja Wine & Tapas competition aimed at budding young chefs.
Former El Bulli chef Ferran Adrià has described tapas as Spain’s greatest food export
Culinary schools and universities in 15 countries have been invited to participate in the competition, which challenges young chefs to create tapas to pair with Rioja wine.
The winning student will receive a €4,000 cash prize and a further prize of an intensive training course at Basque Culinary Center.
The Rioja DOC hopes to exploit the international popularity of tapas which, according to former el Bulli head chef Ferran Adrià, is Spain greatest gastronomic export.
In this context, Rioja DOC has partnered with Basque Culinary Center to launch the Rioja Wine & Tapas competition, targeting students on their last year at culinary schools and universities in 15 countries.
Participants must be over 18 years old and have to be enrolled in their last year at a culinary school or university in one of the following countries: Mexico, Brazil, USA, Germany, United Kingdom, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain, Russia, China, Japan and Taiwan.
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The contest was launched on 1 September and the deadline for submitting proposals is 14 October. Participants must complete a form on the competition website to submit their culinary proposal.
They will be asked for the written recipe, a picture of the tapa, the Rioja wine they have chosen to pair with their tapa and a brief explanation of why they have chosen that particular wine. Participants can choose any type of wine or brand, provided it is a Rioja.
The grand finale of the competition will be held in Spain on 17 November 2016 among four students from different countries and, as it is the school hosting this year’s competition, a finalist student from the Basque Culinary Center.
Finalists will be expected to prepare their culinary proposal for 25 people and a panel of experts will choose the winning tapa. The finals will be part of a three-day trip to Spain during which the students can discover Rioja DOC and San Sebastián, a city with the greatest number of Michelin-starred restaurants per square metre in the world.