Pe­ter Ray Blood

Every­thing seemed to be in abun­dance last Sun­day at the Blan­chisseuse Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre Grounds when the Min­istry of Tourism and Tourism De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny (TDC) host­ed the first of two Pot Spoon Throw Down com­pe­ti­tions. There was an abun­dance of per­fect weath­er, an abun­dance of peo­ple, an abun­dance of live en­ter­tain­ment, and of course an abun­dance of ex­cel­lent food.

Be­ing judged on the day was fish but pa­trons al­so got the op­por­tu­ni­ty of to en­joy re­al "coun­try sweet hand" as cooks from Blan­chisseuse and its en­vi­rons pre­pared a wide va­ri­ety of in­dige­nous cui­sine, in­clu­sive of cur­ry duck and goat, yard fowl, pro­vi­sion, callaloo, pi­geon peas, and sweets like toolum, sug­ar cake and tamarind balls. Apart from the food, there were al­so a De­mo Kitchen, Craft Mar­ket, Food Courts and Chil­dren's Play Cen­tre, com­plete with a mam­moth Boun­cy Cas­tle. The en­tire she­bang was host­ed by The Vibe 105FM disc jock­ey CG and ace pan­nist Noel La Pierre.

The en­tourage mak­ing the trip to this scenic North Coast lo­cale in­clud­ed Tourism Min­is­ter Dr Ru­pert Grif­fith; TDC di­rec­tors Al­imud­din Mo­hammed and Ju­dith Mark; To­co San­gre Grande Coun­cil­lor Ter­ry Ron­don; for­mer Sports Min­is­ter Manohar Ram­saran; Ho­tels, Restau­rants and Tourism As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Michelle Palmer; and, 2011 Taste of the Caribbean Com­pe­ti­tion cham­pi­on, Team T&T. Four teams com­pet­ed in the Best Fried Fish Con­test and up for grabs were two cheques in the sums of $2,500 (Peo­ple's Choice) and $5,000 (Best Over­all.) With ad­ju­di­cat­ing by two pan­els of judges, in­clud­ing knowl­edge­able food con­nossieurs like chief judge Michael Abra­ham, Derek Cadet, Rossi Grey, restau­ra­teur Phyl­lis Vieira and jour­nal­ist BC Pires, Sun­shine Team took home both top prizes.

The sec­ond of the Pot Spoon Throw Down com­pe­ti­tions is sched­uled for next Sun­day in San­gre Grande and it is themed Pork & Home Made Wine. Once again cooks will be judged by a mix of ex­pe­ri­enced chefs and celebri­ty judges. De­liv­er­ing his ad­dress to open last Sun­day's com­pe­ti­tion, Min­is­ter Grif­fith re­vealed that Trinidad and To­ba­go will play host to a World Culi­nary Fes­ti­val & Com­pe­ti­tion in Oc­to­ber.