Cardiff and Vale College Hospitality students on the pass at Gethin Jenkins Testimonial Dinner

Hospitality and Catering students from across Cardiff and Vale College played a central role in a special Testimonial Dinner for Blues player and Wales and British and Irish Lions star Gethin Jenkins this week.

The students helped set up the Atrium in the College’s City Centre Campus ahead of the event, and worked with College’s The Classroom restaurant team on pre-event preparation. On the night they served canapés at the champagne reception in the College’s Success Centre, set up and worked in temporary kitchens in the CAVC Theatr Michael Sheen preparing food. At front of house they also served 230 covers to the guests, including some of the biggest names in Welsh rugby.

For many of the learners it will have been the first time they had worked an event on this scale.

CAVC Deputy head of Catering, Hospitality and Food Manufacturing Eric Couturier said: “The students were excellent – I am very, very proud of them. Some of the students came from our Colcot Road Campus in Barry and some from Cardiff and they integrated together really well and provided very good service. I could not have asked for more from them.

“This dinner was a fantastic experience for the learners – it gave them a new challenge and you would never normally get an opportunity like this in a training environment because of the scale. In our restaurants we have 60-70 covers and here they were serving 230 covers; it’s banqueting, it’s something completely different that adds to their skills.”

Level 2 Hospitality student Rhys Paterson, 16 and from Cardiff, worked at the Gethin Jenkins Testimonial Dinner. He said: “It was good experience for me and I enjoyed it very much. It was a real learning curve and I can take the skills I learned from it into my future.

“I want to one day own my restaurant and maybe become a great chef and working on a large scale event like this is an experience that will help me do that.”