Enter to try collaborative team food competition

Roquette America will conduct its first Imagination Creation Food Competition for students who are in food science or culinary art programs.

The competition is designed to bring together today's young minds to collaborate in a team setting by developing an innovative food product in either the culinary, baking or snack foods categories. Participants will be able to register teams of five through Feb. 28.

The Imagination Creation Food Competition will challenge participating teams to concept and prototype a food product in one of the aforementioned three categories. The prototype must utilize one Roquette product ingredient, which will be supplied by Roquette.

Competition submissions are due by March 21 and will include a formal written proposal and edible prototype. Each submission will be then judged by leading industry experts at Roquette America in Geneva.

Of the submissions, three team finalists will be chosen for a trip to Roquette America in Geneva to compete in a live finale on April 10-11. The finals will be hosted at Roquette America's Customer Innovation Center and Culinary Demonstration Kitchen, where the three teams will be able to utilize Roquette America's professional, state-of-the-art kitchen suite to prepare their prototypes.

The three teams will then present their final prototypes to a panel of guest chefs and Roquette experts to crown a winner. The winning team's prototype will be featured at the Roquette America booth within the IFT annual meeting and Food Expo June 21-24 in New Orleans, La. In addition, the winner and runner-up will both receive monetary prizes.

"Today's students are tomorrow's innovators," said Gina Steffensmeier, Director of Marketing, Roquette America. "We are truly excited to bring students from various universities to our state-of-the-art innovation center to give them a head start in working with the next generation of healthy food ingredients."

The Roquette Customer Innovation Center and Culinary Demonstration Kitchen was opened at Roquette America in 2011. Its goal is to offer an inventive environment for customers and food development professionals to collaborate, learn and be inspired. It features advanced laboratories for scientists and customers to work together on product development, a culinary kitchen for prototype demonstrations, a pilot facility for product trials and the Roquette University auditorium for educational seminars.

For more information on the Roquette Imagination Creation Food Competition or to register a team, visit www.roquetteamerica.com/imagination. To learn more about Roquette America's Customer Innovation Center and Culinary Demonstration Kitchen, go to www.roquetteamerica.com/Innovation-Center.