I had the opportunity to judge Manitoba’s edition of the 2016 Mission: ImPULSEible competition on December 14th, 2015 at Red River College.
Mission: ImPULSEible is an annual product development competition for post-secondary students. Contestants are tasked with the challenge of developing innovative food products that contain pulses (pea, lentil, chickpeas, beans), pulse flours or their fractions (fibre, protein, starch). Pulses must be present as a key ingredient in the products developed. The competition invites students from provinces across Canada to participate in this exciting event.
Mission: ImPULSEible is designed to stimulate new ideas and innovation using pulses. Food developers are putting the functionality of pulses to the test and investigating possible food applications such as bakery, meat, pasta, beverages, desserts, snacks and dairy products.
As this year is 2016 International Year of Pulses the Mission of each competitors was to create a delicious product from a traditional food in, of course, an innovative and nutritious way… and that they did.
Manitoba’s competition showcased culinary and business masterminds from Red River College and the University of Manitoba. While the winning team is awarded competing at a national level in Vancouver at CIFST, it is no doubt that each contestant was a winner. Food companies will be lined up to have these product development prodigies working for them.
Manitoba’s competition featured the following products: lentil ravioli, pulse perogies, a sauce trio, a white bean dip and chocolate bean truffles. Congratulations to Sensible Sauces with their Black Bean BBQ Sauce, Red Hot Lentil Sauce and a Chickpea Pesto all make with pulses as their primary ingredient and celebrated the International Year on their bottles with “Did you know” pulse facts!
Very excited to see where these student or should we say “product development gurus end up!”
Thank you to Christine Farkas for organizing the competition, Red River College for hosting and Manitoba Pulse and Soybean Growers for making it possible. Congrats to all the students who killed this Pierce competition and shared their love for pulses! #lovepulses
Daria Lukie is Manager of Brand Development at Pulse Canada