Becoming a Team Member

Becoming a member of ACF Culinary Team USA is a high honor. Working to promote and enhance American cuisine, your skills as a chef will improve as well as further your recognition. Though it is a commitment requiring dedication and teamwork, the results are well worth the effort.

Qualifying

• Before being chosen as a national finalist, competitors are judged in one of two preliminary regional tryout competitions.
• Regional tryouts are two-day sessions that require each chef to prepare one cold-food platter and a four-course hot dinner.
  • Meals are prepared from a list of predetermined ingredients.
  • Pastry chefs are asked to prepare a platter of four to six different desserts.
• Chefs selected to advance to the national competition tryout, held at the National Restaurant Association Restaurant, Hotel-Motel Show, must display a high level of craftsmanship based on solid classical cooking principles and a variety of cooking disciplines incorporating current trends in presentation, technique and taste.

National & Regional Teams

National and regional team members are selected every four years for ACF Culinary Team USA. The current team was named at the 2006 National Restaurant Association Restaurant, Hotel-Motel Show held in Chicago.

ACF Culinary Youth Team USA was chosen at the 2007 ACF National Convention in Orlando, Fla., in July. The competition was fierce among the contending teams. The winning youth team will compete in the 2008 Internationale Kochkunst Ausstellung (IKA) International Culinary Art Competition.