Identifying Culinary Development Opportunities With Chef Ts.mendjargal

Mongolian sushi chef DMendjargal won the Asian cuisine competition at the 15th International Istanbul Gastronomy Festival, which took place from February 2 to 5 at Tuyap Fair Convention and Congress Center in Istanbul, Turkey.The Mongolian team, consisting of master chefs DMendjargal, JOtgonpurev and BBattulga, seized six medals and came in fourth place in the team competition at the fiercely competitive event which saw more than 2,800 master chefs from 30 countries.

DMendjargal currently operates Miko Sushi Restaurant in Ulaanbaatar, allowing people in Mongolia to get a taste of Japan's finest cuisines. He spoke about the 15th International Istanbul Gastronomy Festival and Asian cuisines in the interview below.

Congratulations on winning the International Istanbul Gastronomy Festival this year Can you tell us about the competition?The World Association of Chefs Societies organized the festival in collaboration with the Cooks and Chefs Federation of Turkey earlier this year Over 2,800 chefs from 30 countries competed in 70 categories.I specialize in Japanese culinary, so naturally, I entered the Asian cuisine competition.

Chefs from Japan, Korea, China, India and other Asian countries took part in this competition. Although I doubted that I could outshine them, I was able to win a gold medal.

The Japanese and Koreans have standard principles and recipes for cooking certain cuisines. Hence, I tried to break the traditional Japanese way and infuse it with European food.

I made it easier to eat for anyone.I made a roll, maki sushi, during the competition.

Japanese chefs put rice on top of seaweed. Instead of seaweed, I made a rice ball with fried shrimp inside it.

I paid a great deal of attention to presentation and won.How many times have you entered the festival? Have you participated in other categories?I competed in this festival for the first time this year Director of the Mongolian Association of Master Chefs (MAMC)'s Chefs' Academy JOtgonpurev won silver medal in the Asian cuisines competition and head chef of SouthGobi Sands LLC BBattulga took part too.

It was really good that BBatbaatar, a member judge of the World Master Chefs Society and executive director of MAMC, was appointed as one of the judges of the festival. It's a huge achievement for MongoliaWe came in fourth in the team competition, which was very competitive.

The organizers gave us a box of ingredients that could and couldn't be used together We had to make an appetizer...