Icing on the cake for Firth School’s Sylvia!

Orkney’s school cooks are continuing to serve up success, with another winner being named in a Scottish competition.

With only a weeks’ notice, head cook at Firth Primary School, Sylvia Manson, managed to create a showstopping cake design, which blew away the judges at the ASSIST FM (Facilities Management) Awards 2022 in the “outstanding culinary skills – decorated cake” section.

The theme was “road to recovery” and Sylvia explained how she came up with her design.

“My entry reflects the hard work and dedication shown throughout the pandemic by the unsung heroes, heroes who did not work from home, instead going to work to ensure essential and vital services were maintained and the vulnerable were cared for.

“They all find themselves at the top of the cake after a long and difficult journey through Covid, exhausted they collapse and start to unmask as restrictions ease. Whilst many professions helped to keep the country running, the ones I have displayed are:

• a school cook, we have all worked under difficult social distancing conditions to ensure the vulnerable were kept feed initially moving on quickly to provide a valuable service for all children and staff;
• postman, throughout these fantastic people ensured we were all able to keep in touch;
• supermarket delivery drivers, who have ensured vital provisions were delivered to most vulnerable;
• teachers, honouring those who came in to ensure the safety of those most in need;
• farmers, who ensured the cows were milked, the crops grown, many diversified to provide doorstep deliveries.

“The cake design is a thank you to them all.”

The ASSIST Conference and Gala dinner was held this week in Glasgow, hosted by Dougie Vipond, with guest speakers Sally Loudon, Chief Executive of COSLA, Paul Rankin, Chef/ Owner of Roscoff and Jim Fairlie of the Scottish National Party.

Sylvia, a cook of 32 years, wasn’t able to attend as she was too busy in her day job feeding the schoolchildren at Firth, but she was delighted to hear the news.

“My words were – ‘did nobody else enter?!’ I couldn’t believe it, but I am delighted.”

How will Sylvia be celebrating? “I will be busy making a showstopper cake for the Firth parish table entry into the ‘Baked in the Parish’ competition!”

Orkney’s Catering Manager, Scott Pring, was given the difficult task of ensuring the cake reached the awards in Glasgow in one piece!

He said: “It was a slow and challenging drive shall we say! Despite the short notice, Sylvia managed to come up with a design that, even in icing, depicts a real sense of emotion. We clapped for the NHS and millions were raised in tribute – and rightly so – but there were so many more key workers who played their part and Sylvia has managed to capture the essence of a ‘thank you’ to them in her design.

“We are delighted to have yet another school cook receiving the recognition they deserve. Sylvia joins Karen Bevan and Ellie Newlands in the hall of cooking fame!”

Background:

ASSIST FM is the Association for all the Facilities Management providers within Scotland’s 32 Local authorities. This covers the provision of school meals and council catering, as well as cleaning and janitorial services in all the local authority buildings. ASSIST FM’s main role is to promote the skill sets of the public sector workforce and best practices across the local authority sector. ASSIST FM is the voice of the local authority FM service and represents its members on numerous national committees and steering groups.

You can find out more info on ASSIST at www.assistfm.com