Hyatt Pune Kalyani Nagar organised the third season of ‘Hyatt Culinary Challenge – people cooking for people,’ earlier this month. This fun-filled cook-off saw the participation of the city’s leading corporate honchos who came together to support the SMILE Foundation, Hyatt’s partner NGO in India.
Each participant had 90 minutes to prepare and showcase their recipes. They were paired with a child from SMILE Foundation to help execute the recipe. The event was judged by Corina B Manuel, Regional Editor – Femina; Vidhya Tiwari, Editor-in-Chief – Cariz Magazine; Varun Khanna – Partner and co-founder of Food Prowl; and Sumit Kumar, General Manager, Hyatt Pune Kalyani Nagar.
After the cook-off, young kids performed a dance performance for the attendees. Talking about the event, Sumit Kumar said, “I was glad to see such a great turnout and excited participants. As hoteliers, we understand what goes into the preparation and presentation of food. However seeing our participants put in so much effort speaks volumes about their passion for cooking.”
The winner of the preliminary round was Ayan Dutta, General Manager, Maersk, while the runners-up were Siddharth Naik – Director at Indo Group Asia, Ramneek Jain – COO Spicer India, Deepak Sharma – VP Operations Barclays, Nilesh Neel – Equities Head Deutsche Bank etc.
Held across 13 cities in India, The Hyatt Culinary Challenge was conceptualized as an event to bring together individuals from the corporate world on a common platform where they could showcase their culinary expertise and passion for food in an interactive culinary event. Alongside the preliminary round in Pune, Hyatt India Culinary Challenge preliminary rounds were held in Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi, Goa, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Ludhiana, Mumbai and Raipur this month and the finale will be held at Hyatt Regency Chandigarh.
