Three culinary specialists assigned to U.S. Naval War College (NWC) in Newport, Rhode Island swept the top spots in their category at the Cooks of the Catskill Mountains Competition at State University of New York at Delhi, sponsored by the American Culinary Federation (ACF).

The NWC competitors were Chief Culinary Specialist Michael Edwards, Culinary Specialist 1st Class Jerromiah Payne and Culinary Specialist 2nd Class Jeremey Andersen.

The group took first, second and third places in the Maple Leaf Farms Duck Challenge, which falls into the 'wildcard' category. Wildcard denotes that the classification falls outside normal ACF categories.

The event was an individual competition, not a team event, so each NWC chef prepared, cooked, plated and served his own dish.

As the senior person on the team, Edwards said there is much to learn from these events.

Trends in modern cooking move quickly and are accelerated by television shows and even networks dedicated to the profession. But the core ability to do things correctly in the kitchen will always be most important, according to Edwards.

"There is real value in competition," he said. "You should never rest on your laurels. Food is always changing. And it is always good to be judged based on your skills.

"Can you cook a carrot that tastes good? I don't care if you have all these special things on it. Is it cooked right? That is most important."

Of the categories included in the competition, Edwards picked the wildcard for economic reasons - the competition provided duck.

While they had to provide their own ingredients, getting a free duck was a money saver.

The group saw there were openings at the event on the Tuesday prior to the competition, so they had only a few days to prepare.

"I saw it online and said to the group, 'Hey, let's do this? Do you want to do this?' and we decided to enter," said Edwards.

For the rest of the week during off-duty hours, the team developed a recipe they thought could win.

"After we were done [with work], we would go back and practice dishes," said Edwards. "We got bunch of ducks and started fabricating them, breaking them down, cooking them different ways. And we came up with a dish."

The group paid the competition entrance fee themselves and drove to Delhi at their own expense.

Edwards was excited about the event because it would serve as a training ground for the Armed Forces Culinary Arts Competition held each year in Fort Lee, Va. - the largest military culinary competition in the North America, involving more than 400 cooks.

"Being in the competition is humbling and educational. This is the best team I could have. They're all passionate, all competitive and always trying to improve, always seeing how they can we make it better."

Edwards hopes the team can win the gold medal at Fort Lee, but knows it will be a challenge. It's never easy to do well in these events, according to Edwards.

"You have a bunch of different things going on," he said. "And you have to do them all perfectly and get them into the dish."

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