Wallingford Arcade – A Royal Visit (Of the Culinary Kind!): Spotting Two of the Combined Services Culinary Arts Team in Our Arcade

We love meeting our customers, but a recent visit to our shop brought a unique twist that left us feeling incredibly inspired. This week, we had the absolute pleasure of welcoming two members of the elite Combined Services Culinary Arts Team (CSCAT) through our doors! Christopher Beavis (Captain) and Robert Donnelly (Vice Captain).

For those who might not be familiar with them, CSCAT is essentially the Olympic squad of military catering. The team brings together the absolute finest chefs from across the Royal Navy, Royal Marines, British Army, and Royal Air Force. Together, they represent the UK Armed Forces on the global stage, competing in massive international tournaments like the World Cup and the Culinary Olympics.

The chefs popped in to browse our collection and picked out a few items to use as backdrops for their upcoming culinary displays. Catering at that elite level is just as much about visual artistry and presentation as it is about incredible flavour, so it was fascinating to hear a little bit about how they build their show stopping presentation tables.

While we can’t reveal what specific culinary masterpieces these items will be framing next, we are incredibly proud that our pieces are playing a tiny, supporting role in the background of such world-class talent.

We want to wish the entire Combined Services Culinary Arts Team the very best of luck in their upcoming National and International competitions. We will certainly be cheering them on from the sidelines!

The 27th IKA/Culinary Olympics is taking place 11-16 February 2028 in Stuttgart.

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To learn more about the incredible work, training, and competition schedules of these military culinary masters, you can check out the official Combined Services Culinary Arts Team on their Facebook page here.

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