The current world record holder for the ‘longest cooking marathon’ Effiong Bassey, will be participating in the National Institute for Tourism and Hospitality (NIHOTOUR) Gastronomy festival on Saturday, at the Abuja International Conference Centre.
This year’s Gastronomy Festival is the third consecutive food and beverage exhibition and sampling event, initiated and annually organized by NIHOTOUR, since 2021.
Speaking on the invitation of Hilda Bacci to the Gastronomy Festival in Abuja, the Director General of NIHOTOUR, Nura Sani Kangiwa, said that “by law, NIHOTOUR, as Nigeria’s lead hospitality and tourism occupational skills development Institute is required to mitigate the skills-gap challenges of personnel in the industry.
Kangiwa added that the festival is to equally drum-up support for practitioners that are, despite the odds, achieving measurable success in the tradecraft and “Hilda Bassey is one of such rare cases of gastronomic success Nigeria has attained.”
He explained that “Besides the new world record of cooking achieved by Hilda, as adjudged by the committee of the Guinness World Records, for us, in NIHOTOUR, we recognize that her success has become a beacon that is now encouraging more Nigerian youths to take up careers in the hospitality and catering sub-sectors.
”You see, as an occupational skills development institute, our primary mandate is to enable people to acquire requisite skills to become self-employed, by adding value to the hospitality and tourism industry, and Hilda Bassey exemplifies that! So, like most Nigerians, NIHOTOUR is impressed with her commitment to excel.”
Vanguard newspaper gathered that this year the Spanish embassy has brought in chef Alex Marugan, a celebrated Spanish chef, to train and share best practices and emerging global trends of culinary arts with some select culinary schools in Nigeria.
Chef Alex will prepare and display the best of Spanish cuisines at the Gastronomy Festival on Saturday for visitors to the event to engage him and taste his meals.
This year’s Gastronomy Festival with the theme “Culinary Arts: The Gateway to Growing Tourism Destinations” will feature public exhibition and free tasting of hundreds of culinary masterpieces from Nigeria’s 300 ethnic groups and the international communality including cuisines from China, Senegal, Trinidad & Tobago, and Cote D’Ivoire.
Vanguard News
