467. Great British Menu Central Region Heats (2).

 

  Continued from Blog 466 …

  Thom Bateman chose to present a pork-based dish for his main course and titled it Origin of the Species which celebrated Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution and illustrated his theme by centring it on the evolution of the wild boar to the domestic pig. The dish was made up of braised and shredded wild boar shoulder and collar served on a pork fat boulangere with barbecued mangalitsa pork fillet glazed with black garlic and honey accompanied by barbecued Granny Smith apple and a pickled walnut ketchup, celeriac purée and pork sauce.

Wild boar collar and shoulder

Ingredients for Original of the Species - Mangalitsa to right of the picture.

When delivering his verdict on the dishes Tommy Banks noted that only once before had a pork dish won the right to be the Great British Menu banquet main course. Banks made very positive points about the dish and had no negative points to mention. He awarded it 9 points.

  For his predessert Bateman served what he described as a chive biscuit ice cream sandwich to honour the scientist Dorothy Hodgkin and her work on X rays. The predessert was made from homemade pine oil, sugar and citric acid in the form of a spruce sherbert, a cherry gel and the ice cream was replaced by a pistachio yoghurt. When judging it Banks felt that the bone shape made it look like a dog biscuit which he found off-putting but he placed it second out of the three presdesserts.

  For his dessert course, Thom Bateman presented a dish titled The First Tycoon which celebrated Josiah Wedgwood. This took the form of a chocolate mousse marquise made from black tea infused cream with a bowl of cocoa nib, soya bean crumb and sherry gel topped by raw milk ice cream, caramel and blond chocolate crisps, all to celebrate what Bateman described as the “really famous tearoom” at the Wedgwood factory site. The marquise was not wholly convincing as a jasperware decoration and looked somewhat rough edged though the overall dish looked attractive plated up as it was on beautiful blue jasperware pottery.

   When presenting his conclusions, Banks felt that the dessert was “quite sweet” and he did not feel that Bateman had “got the balance quite right” and consequently awarded Bateman’s dish seven points giving him a total of 32 points which was not sufficient to keep him in the competition. 

  The West Midlands had therefore lost its two representatives and Sally Abé eventually won the third round of the heat and was selected to go forward to represent the Midlands and East Anglia in the final selection of those chefs who would cook at the 2025 banquet. In the final heat her main course was iawarded a perfect 40 points and she proved to be a worthy and charming winner of the 2025 Midlands and East competition.