Chef Tyler Brodkin wins competition
Chad Tyler Brodkin, of Blacksburg, Virginia Tech's Dietrick Dining Center's executive chef, has been awarded a grand prize by the ConAgra Foods/Lamb Weston's Lamb Supreme® Mashed Potato Recipe and Application Challenge.
Brodkin's recipe, Stuffed Pasta Shells, for baked potato shells was selected from competitors representing every segment of the food service industry. Winners were selected based on best use of the Lamb's Supreme® Mashed Potato product, application to food service, creativity, and taste.
One innovative facet of Brodkin's winning recipe is the use of large, sea shell-type pasta, which is substituted for the typical hollowed potato skins. To complete this dish, a mixture of garlic roasted mashed potatoes, three cheeses, and fine prosciutto ham is piped into the pasta shells and presented with Alfredo sauce, additional prosciutto, broccoli, and tomatoes.
Brodkin's prizes include transportation to and lodging at the new Calistoga Ranch Resort in California's Napa Valley and a two-day culinary seminar at the prestigious Culinary Institute of America at Greystone.
At age 14, Brodkin, originally from Wittlich, Germany, began working in kitchens in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania. After a three-year apprenticeship with the American Culinary Federation, he accepted his first position as the executive chef for Resorts, U.S.A., in northeastern Pennsylvania.
Brodkin has won 13 gold, silver, and bronze medals as well as two best-in-show awards in American Culinary competitions.
In 1992, he competed in Frankfurt, Germany, on the Culinary Olympic team. He won a gold medal that year for a vegan display, the first of its kind in that competition. He won another gold medal at the 1996 Olympic event in Berlin for another vegan display. Brodkin's gold medal wins set an Olympic trend for years to come — national teams are now required to include a vegan display among their entries. He also won the third-place award for best vegan recipe in the United States in the 2003 NACUFS Cuisine Creators contest.
Founded in 1872 as a land-grant college, Virginia Tech has grown to become among the largest universities in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Today, Virginia Tech's eight colleges are dedicated to putting knowledge to work through teaching, research, and outreach activities and to fulfilling its vision to be among the top research universities in the nation. At its 2,600-acre main campus located in Blacksburg and other campus centers in Northern Virginia, Southwest Virginia, Hampton Roads, Richmond, and Roanoke, Virginia Tech enrolls more than 28,000 full- and part-time undergraduate and graduate students from all 50 states and more than 100 countries in 180 academic degree programs.
