The culinary expertise of Michael and Christine Thompson was acknowledged at the 2002 Clubs NSW Chefs Taste of Gold Culinary Challenge held on Saturday, July 20.

The challenge was held at the Ryde Campus of the North Sydney TAFE and the Moss Vale team took out the silver medal.

The Culinary Challenge is run by Clubs NSW, the peak representative body of registered clubs in NSW.

Clubs NSW chairman, Pat Rogan said the challenge aimed to promote the availability of premium quality al la carte dining in registered clubs, while at the same time motivating chefs to strive for continuing excellence.

Teams were evaluated on both kitchen and cooking criteria.

Michael and Christine both believe that the judges were impressed by the fact that they sourced all their produce locally and the Friday evening menus changed accordingly to the availability of that produce.

There were eight judges who observed their every move.

"They were watching us all the time," said Christine, who only works in the kitchen at Moss Vale when they are very busy.

Michael is the full-time chef who has been employed by the club for 18 months.

Having worked together for 15 years, the pair met when Christine was an apprentice and Michael the head chef. The couple cooked their way through Europe for two years and found that they picked up much from the experience.

Michael felt that working in the smallest club that was represented at the finals was an advantage as they were used to doing all that was necessary from preparing to serving.

The club that came third was Tweed Heads Bowling Club who has a catering staff of 65 compared with three casuals at Moss Vale.

Christine said that it was interesting that they found that the kitchen at Ryde extremely large and well equipped whereas others, from larger clubs, felt that the kitchen was small.

They needed to prepare their food efficiently, fulfilling appropriate work practices as well as present well balanced, appealing and imaginative dishes.