Hundreds of well-known world class chefs, VIPs in the food business and press people celebrated the opening of the 2012 Madrid Fusion and enjoyed all the cooking shows, demonstrations and took part in the seminars during the whole period of the event.
This year, Korea was the guest country. At the welcome ceremony and other special events on the eve of the official opening, ‘Korean food special’ dinner parties took place.
aT President Mr. Kim Jea-soo, run two booths to promote Korean food materials and a group of promising foods for export. The main vegetables on display were Chinese cabbage, garlic, onion, radish, green onion, potato, hot pepper, carrots and shingo pear. These are the main vegetables for traditional Korean dishes.
Possibly, one of the best known Korean vegetables is the King Oyster Mushroom, it is a good ingredient for a creative new dish, it can also replace meat which is good for vegetarians.
Chef Sanghoon Degeimbre who is renowned for pushing conceptual boundaries in a seamless, inspiring marriage of Belgian and Korean cuisine, said "I work with Korean pear and can find them in Belgian markets. It's pretty new to find fresh Korean products in Paris or Brussels, we didn't know about the richness of heritage of fresh Korean food here in Europe."
Mr. Jongseo Park, Director for export, at aT, said that this event served as a good opportunity to promote/place Korean foods and its culture in world-class cuisine. Finalizing his comment, he says "I will do my best to upgrade Korean cuisine as one of major world-class dishes by supporting star-chefs in E.U. to newly introduced Korean foods in the EU.”