SAN ANTONIO, Texas – Airmen from 11 Food 2.0 installations went head-to-head in the Salute Hospitality Epicurean Faceoff culinary battle Sept. 17 at the San Antonio Culinary Institute of America.
The SHEF competition, sponsored by the Air Force Services Center and its industry partner Aramark, is the marquee event of a year-long quarterly competition to give culinary Airmen the chance to display their cooking skills and creativity.
The winners of the fourth quarter competitions – consisting of the winners from the previous three quarters – earned the chance to compete for the crown with Airman Sharon Villacres Baracaldo from Altus AFB, Oklahoma, winning top SHEF honors.
Food 2.0 is part of the services center’s Healthy Food Initiative, which delivers improved, healthier food options for Airmen, Guardians and other patrons at 28 Department of the Air Force installations, said Jim Krueger, AFSVC’s Food and Beverage Division chief. The competition featured representatives from each Food 2.0 location managed with industry partner Aramark.
“When you consider Great Power Competition and developing multi-capable mission ready Airmen, programs like this help refine our food service programs to be more relevant, not only at home station -- our power projection platforms -- but in a contingency environment where we are fueling the human weapon system,” said Col. Chip Hollinger, AFSVC Mission Operations director. “Providing safe and healthy food options for our warfighters is critical to mission success.”
All SHEF competitors were told the contents of the contest basket, with salmon as the protein, in advance so they could perfect a recipe with their home station chef team before heading to San Antonio. They were then able to supplement the basket using the CIA pantry.
Baracaldo won the competition with a salmon chorizo medley topped with creamy chorizo tomato sauce, which was inspired by her favorite restaurant in Queens, New York.
“My first competition at Altus was when I was fresh out of technical school in February,” Baracaldo said. “I felt very unprepared and wasn’t ready, but my noncommissioned officers encouraged me to try it.”
The Airman turned to her mother’s cooking and Colombian roots for that dish and, even though she was competing against more seasoned chefs at her installation, “the judges really liked my dish and that propelled me forward,” she said.
“I was going up against a lot of senior airmen and airmen first class who had been in the Air Force a lot longer and had more experience cooking, but they gave me a lot of pointers on how to cook certain things, what to do, especially in our day-to-day food preparation for the DFAC. All of the things I was able to learn from them I incorporated in the second competition,” Baracaldo said.
Senior Airman Briana Deleon from Davis-Monthan AFB, Arizona, may not have won the SHEF crown but said it was a great opportunity to explore and enjoy while learning new things to take back to her installation, teach her fellow Airmen and get them excited.
“Competitions like this give us new challenges which is really good, especially when it comes to food. I feel like sometimes we can get a little complacent and things like this give us time to enjoy cooking. It also provides our customers with better food service and adds new things into the mix,” she said.
That increase in knowledge and enthusiasm from culinary Airmen is exactly what AFSVC and Aramark program managers were aiming for.
“One of the great things about competitions like this is that it provides our Airmen the opportunity to operate on a platform like the CIA where they’re surrounded by professional chefs to sharpen and hone their skills,” Hollinger said. “To get here, they had to compete at different levels … then, they come here, further sharpen those skills, take them back to their home stations and implement what they’ve learned in their installation food service programs.
“It was a great learning opportunity that makes us stronger and more capable when they return back to the installation-level programs we support,” the colonel added.
Leading up to the now annual SHEF competition, the program has been very successful with three or four Airmen every quarter at each base participating, said Daniel Ovanin, National Account Director for Aramark Hospitality overseeing the Air Force line of business.
“From the quarterly competitions to the SHEF competition, it’s been great for morale, great training and bragging rights, and we’re already starting to plan our competition for next year to make it bigger and better with more participation,” he added.