Petersham Nursery wins the 2017 Gosset Matchmakers Competition

On September 5th, Gosset Champagne and Imbibe held the final round of the much anticipated 2017 champagne and food matching competition at Le Cordon Bleu London.

The contestants consisted of five teams of chefs and sommeliers from prestigious restaurants all competing for a chance to experience an exclusive Gosset champagne trip!

Amongst the contestants were sommelier Timothy Connor and chef Dario Catapano of Bread Street Kitchen, sommelier Victor Retif and chef Auriane Roux from The Lanesborough hotel, sommelier Julien Sarrasin and chef David Salt of Club Gascon, and the runners up sommelier Camille Mercury and chef Pierre Minotti from Hélène Darroze and The Connaught.

Finalists were judged by an expert panel including Jean-Pierre Cointreau, the chairman of Champagne Gosset, Xavier Rousset MS, Louise Gordon of Lime Wood Hotel, Julie Sheppard Managing Editor at Imbibe, Will Oatley, MD of Louis Latour Agencies, Matthieu Longuère MS, Wine Development Manager at Le Cordon Bleu London and chef Anthony Boyd from Le Cordon Bleu London.

The competing teams spent 3 hours in the state-of-the-art kitchens to prepare their best dish yet. The dishes served had to compliment the Gosset Blanc de Blancs. They were judged based on various categories including presentation, quality of the food and wine pairing, concept and creativity.

Taking the above into account, the winners, sommelier Raphael Laurent and chef Ambra Papa confidently put their skills to the test and prepared a surprising dish of Ricotta di bufala & Sicilian almond gnudi with Cornish lobster, pear and violas as their final dish which matched the Gosset Blanc de Blancs very well. One judge described the complimentary food pairing as a ‘beautiful combination of flavours and textures’.

Sommelier Laurent and chef Papa have won a free trip to visit Gosset in Champagne to learn more about the unique Gosset range with chef de cave, Odilon de Varine!

We are honoured to have hosted the Gosset Matchmakers competition here at Le Cordon Bleu London and wish all the contestants the best in their future endeavours.