11th International Contest for Synthetic Cooking ("Note by Note")

International Contest for Note by Note" Cooking N°11

Topic:
Waste and losses

Organizers:
Roisin Burke  (roisin.burke@TUDublin.ie), Yolanda Rigault (yolanda.rigault@wanadoo.fr), Hervé This (herve.this@inrae.fr)

The final event took place September 8, 2023, in Palaiseau (France)
Under the patronage of the INRAE-AgroParisTech International Centre for Molecular and Physical Gastronomy
With the support of the compagnies Louis François, Kitchen Lab, Institut Cordon Bleu.

This international jury was composed of :

Jean-Pierre Lepeltier, International Club Toques Blanches
Philippe Clergue, Institut Le Cordon bleu, Paris
Yolanda Rigault, biochemist ex-CEA, Paris
Patrick Terrien, International Club Toques Blanches
Sandrine Kault-Perrin, Louis François Inc.

The jury met on the new AgroParisTech-INRAE campus, in Palaiseau, near Paris (France) and through both with live and online discussions the shortlisted candidates defended their work.

After an introduction (Hervé This) showing how Synthetic Cooking (the technique) and Note by Note Cooking (the art trend based on the synthetic cooking technique) evolved with the years, Dao Nguyen and Pasquale Altomonte demonstrated two dishes using the odorant compounds from the company Kitchen Lab.

Then, after a fierce deliberation, the jury announced the prizes for this 11th International Note to Note Cooking Contest :

First Prize: Dnyanada Shende, for her dish  Summer with Sustainability

Second Prize: Shivani Abensour, for her dish The Ugly Apple

Third Prize : Léa Bellot, Clémentine Hong, Angèle Guéguen, for their dish La vie en rose

All pictures of the event here.
The whole event was recorded, and you will find it here.

A reminder :

The preselected competitors were :
Shivani Abensour
Angèle Gueguen, Léa Bellot, Clémentine Hong
Laura Munar
Dnyanada Shende
Karen Trevino

Synthetic ("Note by Note") Cooking

Synthetic Cooking is indeed “synthetic cooking”,  a culinary technique using pure compounds, in order to build food (i.e., dishes) and drinks.
The cook has to decide for the shapes, consistencies, tastes, odours, trigeminal sensations (pungencies, freshnesses…), temperatures, colours…
Of course, it deals with questions of nutrition, toxicity, and is part of the large “Note by Note Project” for sustainable development, important for feeding humankind in 2050, when the population of the Earth will perhaps reach 10 billion people. This project is an important contribution to the fight against spoilage, while sparing water, energy, foodstuffs, and taking care of the environment.

The goal of this 11th contest:
Wastes and losses

For this new contest, we invite competitors (in the three categories: chefs, students, amateurs) to create dishes that have a  relationship with the announced topic as close as possible. Also he closer to pure note by note, the better. And the flavour of the proposed dish is obviously important !

More details
The issue of waste is of primary importance for food security in the world, as up to 30 % of food is wasted today. The issue is not simple, as there are many different reasons for this waste. In the kitchen, for example, peeling potatoes is certainly creating waste, but the discarded parts contain glycoalkaloids such as solanine, solanidine, chaconine, which are toxic over a quite low limit. And most plant tissues, also, contain "natural pesticides" in their outer parts.

For the criteria, the first goal of competitors is to produce dishes that :
1. deal with the "waste" issue
2. are as close as possible to pure note by note cooking (i.e., using pure compounds)
3. are good!
3. are original.

About the first criterion, one has to make a difference between “pure note by note cooking”, and “practical note by note cooking.
-  the “pure note by note cooking” technique means using only perfectly pure compounds,
- “practical note by note cooking” technique allows the use of mostly  pure fractions: for example, oil is a mixture of triglycerides, or corn starch is only 80 % pure amylopectin, but it would not change much if one particular triglyceride were used, on pure amylopectin. And, of course, why not mix the new ingredients and old ones (meat, fish, egg, vegetable and fruits)… but the closest to the pure note by note technique the better.
The participants will be free to purchase the ingredients or to product them by themselves. For example, lixiviation of flour can product gluten and starch, and storing oils in the fridge or in the deep freeze can make various fat fractions, with different properties.
For odours, they can be extracted by various means (storing a raw material in oil, distillation, etc.), but odorant compounds can now be found on line, in companies such as Iqemusu (www.iqemusu.com).

For the contest, participants have to apply in various categories

(1) Professional chefs: they will be judged on their skills to produce a recipe using pure compounds or a mixture of pure compounds and designing the shape, colour, texture etc. This group have access to specific note by note ingredients and specialized equipment in professional kitchens and should have a good skills level.

(2) Students: depending on the applications, there can be two groups, those that are culinary arts students and those that are science students.
Like the professional chefs, the former most likely have access to specific note by note ingredients and special equipment. The other students may or may not have access to these ingredients or equipment. In the case of the culinary student the judging criteria is similar to that for the professional chefs but the level of skills of culinary arts students may be less. If the other students have a science background, the judging criteria could include the use of scientific knowledge to maximize the use of ingredients which were available.

(3) Amateurs - the best use of ingredients which were available.

Where can you find the ingredients?
For cooking Note by Note, you simply need your kitchen, kitchen cupboards and supermarket. Below, you can find pure compounds e.g. water, sugar, salt, xanthan gum, lecithin etc.
Some can be extracted. For example, if you acidify milk and extract curds (mostly casein), you prepare the whey. Or from wheat flour, if you make a dough and wash starch off to, you can separate gluten (that can also be bought at bakers).

There are other cheap ways to get ingredients:
- look for deals on the internet through companies such as Amazon
- email suppliers and ask for free samples (small amounts)
- ask supplier companies for free samples.

Examples of suppliers
Iqemusu (2017). The 24 Notes. [online]. Available at: https://iqemusu.com/en/the-24-notes-note-by-note-cooking/
Louis François (2019).  Louis François- Food Ingredients Since 1908. Available at: http://www.louisfrancois.com/index_en.html
MSK (2019), MSK catalogue. [online] Available at: http://msk-ingredients.com/msk-catalogue-2019/?page=1.
Sosa (2019). Sosa Catalogue. Available at: https://www.sosa.cat/
Texturas (2012). Texturas Albert y Ferran Adria. Available at: http://albertyferranadria.com/eng/texturas.html

Each proposed dish will have to be :  
    1. described in a .doc file by a recipe  (Roman 12) giving
        1. the ingredients, including quantities
        2. the process
    2. shown by photographs.

The candidates will have to accept that their recipes and pictures can be used (with their name) by the organizers and the partners of the contest (see authorization of use in the bottom of this document).

Evaluation:
Close relationship with the topic
Feasibility, reproducibility
Originality of the work.
Using pure compounds will be preferred to using fractions.
Of course, the productions should not be toxic.
The flavour complexity will be appreciated: dishes have a shape, consistency, odor, taste, trigeminal sensation, temperature…

Who can participate?
The contest is free, open to all. But there will be different categories:
- culinary professionals (chefs),
- students,
- amateurs.

How to participate?
For applying, it is enough to send an email to icmg@agroparistech.fr  with post address, phone number, signed authorization of diffusion of the  contest material.
Then, for proposing the result, one has to send a file (fichier .doc)  to icmg@agroparistech.fr  describing the recipe in details, with a powerpoint document (fichier .ppt)  showing the various steps and the final result, with high resolution pictures 300 dpi.

Dates :
- application at any time before 20th of August 2023.
- document being sent before the 25th of August 2022.

Evaluation:
The evaluation will be performed in two stages:
1. display of all recipes, and preselection by a jury, with possible votes by the public
2. evaluation between preselected recipes by a Jury composed of:
Yolanda Rigault (organizer)
Jean-Pierre Lepeltier (Toques Blanches Internationales)
Patrick Terrien (Toques Blanches Internationales)
Sandrine Kault-Perrin (Louis François Inc)
Philippe Clergue (Cordon bleu)

Prize Event:
 AgroParisTech, Paris (8 September 2022)
Prizes will be given by the partners. The best results will be displayed on various internet sites (Forum Note à Note d'AgroParisTech...). They will be shown on posters during itinerary exhibitions.

Thanks to our partners: Louis François, Kitchen Lab
                                       
           
For your application, please send this "Autorisation de diffusion"

Je sous-signé ……………….. demeurant ……………………….. autorise les organisateurs et les partenaires du Troisième Concours International de Cuisine Note à Note à diffuser les recettes et les images soumises pour participation au concours.

Fait à ………………………….. le …………………………………..

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