Welcome to our new eb site and my Soapbox for May. In this edition we will be reporting the excellent results by the members of the Air Vanuatu National Culinary Team in Wellington, upcoming events, sponsorship opportunities and once again including a few health and safety issues and recipes for our readers.

I recently had the pleasure of judging the Chef of the Capital competition held in Wellington, this was great honour and was testament to the work that the Association has been doing here in Vanuatu with our own Competition. Later this year during the Origin Culinary Arts Show we will be hosting the inaugural Pacific Rim Challenge and with acceptance so far from the NZ, Australia, Fiji and PNG we are expecting a competition of high caliber and one that shall generate a great deal of interest overseas. This will be the first time that all the Pacific Rim countries will have competed against each other at a local event and the Vanuatu Chefs Association is proud to be the instigators of this competition. The Origin Culinary Arts Show will be held on the 11-14 November 2009 and we are looking forward to a bigger and better event than before.

Further information on both the Origin Culinary Arts Show and the Pacific Rim Challenge will be released when available.

Grant Johnston
President