It was an evening filled with ‘Madu Thalapa’, ‘Bathala Roti’, ‘Sour sop Maluwa’, ‘Maikkan Malu’, ‘Stuffed Pumpkin Leaves’ - few of the many delicacies tasted by the invitees at the ‘Jetwing Go Sri Lankan culinary challenge 2009’ held at Jetwing Seashells Negombo.
Chef teams from the Nine Jetwing hotels competed in this competition, the first of its kind, held as part of a project aimed at exploring, capturing and preserving our indigenous National Culinary Heritage.
Chef Pubilis of Mount Lavinia Hotel, the keynote speaker at the launch of this program two years ago set the tone for the project, emphasizing the need of preserving a 2500 year old tradition of Sri Lankan cuisine that is not only unique, vivid in many ways, nutritious in many forms and a fountain of wellness; however not as yet sufficiently recognized as one of the worlds best for the simple reason that it remains largely unknown to the world of gastronomy, outside of Sri Lanka.
After the initial foray last year, the Jetwing chef teams have continued to delve deep, going into a lot of research, learning from senior citizens in the hinterland of our land, in far flung villages as far away as remote villages like Meemure in the central province and Monaragala in the deep south, for food that was becoming less consumed and gradually disappearing from the kitchen hearth and the home table; valuable insights and invaluable wisdom which came to be discoverd and reproduced at the Go Sri Lanka competition this year.
These food and culinary preparations were being cooked as we strolled around observing the eminent panel of judges that included Senaka Tantrige, the former Chef lecturer and Vice Principal of SLI THM, Dhammika Gunatileke, the Senior Lecturer and Sarath Kumara also from The Hotel School.
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