By Sean Moriarty

While the soccer World Cup may be the hot topic at the moment - one young Killarney chef bagged himself his own world title.

James McGrath from Ardshanovooley, was part of a 12-strong Irish team that won two bronze medals at a Culinary World Cup Final in Kirchberg, Luxembourg.

James is a Demi Chef at the famed Oak Room at Adare Manor.

He was part of a team that trained with Limerick and Clare Education and Training Board’s College of Further Education and Training, Hospitality Campus for the international Villeroy and Boch Culinary World Cup Final 2022.

The Irish team was up against 55 different nations from five continents.

The team was only founded four months ago and James was the last to be selected in October and many of their opponents have been working together for up to eight years.

The Irish team took bronze in the 'Hot Kitchen’ and 'Tables of Fire’ sections of the competition.

The first part saw them prepare a full meal, from food-preparation to final delivery, for up to 70 guests with James responsible for fish-based starters.

The second competition saw the team prepare cold platters for tables of 12, eight of whom were guests and the other four judges, but the Irish team were unable to identify what role each of the 12 diners played.

“A lot of the other teams were impressed with us, some of the junior teams have been training together for three years, the senior teams are together eight years and we only started a few months ago,” James told the Killarney Advertiser.

“We were judged on a lot of things, like preparation time, how clean we worked and food waste management.”