A young woman from the city whose mother wanted her to be an IAS officer has found her calling in the kitchen and is a step closer to her dream of becoming a chef.
Naureen Shaikh, 20, won the bronze trophy among 53 participants from across the world in a young chef competition.
Naureen’s culinary interest started when she was in Class VIII and she opted for home science as a subject right up to Class XII.
Going against her mother’s wishes of pursuing geography, she took admission in a hotel management institute.
On Saturday, when Naureen won the third position in the International Young Chef Olympiad, her mother told her: “You have made me proud.”
Naureen joined IIHM in 2020 after passing out of Calcutta Girls’ High School.
“My interest in cooking started when I was in Class VIII and I would always look for feedback on what I had prepared because that would help me improve,” she said.
For six months prior to the competition, she would spend almost 12 hours in the institute “making the same dish over and over again”.
“It was exhausting and at times frustrating. But hardwork, consistency and dedication matter,” she said.
In the final round of the competition, Naureen, like other participants, had to make two portions of French omelette, four portions of a prawn entree and a dessert.
The finalists were judged on innovation, optimum utilisation of ingredients, hygiene and variety of cooking techniques.
As a student, Naureen had interned in France for six months.
“It was a Michelin star restaurant. Working in the kitchen, I learnt that the customer gives us bread and butter and we have to give them value for money,” she said.
Naureen’s kitchen coaches said she was fast and “precise”.
“She asks a lot of questions, which makes her a good learner,” said Sanjay Kak, director of culinary arts, IIHM.
Her first coaches were her grandmother and mother who, like in most Indian homes, “cook for the entire family”.
“I, too, picked that up but my food was more experimental. I loved to experiment with chicken,” she said.
So, her butter chicken was a butter chicken roulade or butter chicken momo.
Naureen Shaikh in the International Young Chef Olympiad
Soon after joining BSc in hospitality administration, she realised that how she cooked at home has to stay in the “home kitchen”.
“In a professional kitchen, processes, steps and presentation are important and you cannot compromise. It is the result of effort and not the way we rustle up comfort food at home,” she said.
Her internship in Auch, in France, taught her to be confident and that often, there can be no room for mistakes.
“Despite being an intern, there was no mercy in the kitchen. You were given responsibilities because they would see whether you meet their expectations,” she said.
She came back from France not just with a bagful of experience but also having learnt to cook pâte sablée (sweet tart dough), pomme de terre duchesse (consisting of a purée of mashed potato, egg yolk and butter, which is forced from a piping bag or hand-moulded into various shapes that are then baked in a high-temperature oven until golden) and canard rôti (roasted duck).
For the Young Chef Olympiad, Naureen was mentored by Sudipto Mazumder of IIHM.
“Winning a trophy in a competition like this makes a huge difference in the lives of young individuals. Companies would vie to take her. Her market value as a hospitality professional would go up,” said Suborno Bose, chief mentor, IIHM, and chairman, Young Chef Olympiad.
Naureen knows most parents believe that their children should study medicine or engineering because that would make their careers secure.“I am thankful to my mother that despite her wish she let me study what I wanted to,” she told The Telegraph.
Her comfort food remains dal, chawal, sabzi, fish and “apne haath ka chicken”.
