A SWINDON chef has made mincemeat of 18 talented opponents to win a national cooking award.

Richard Bowden, who works as executive head chef at Shrivenham's Joint Services Command and Staff College, won a crystal trophy and £1,000 after being named as chef of the year by his firm, Compass Group.

He emerged as the most talented of the 19 chefs competing in the Compass national final in Portsmouth.

The finalists were selected from thousands of chefs working on Compass' 8,000 food service contracts across the country.

All 19 chefs spent three hours preparing a fine dining menu. Richard's included crab meat salad with beetroot, duck breast with wild mushroom, liver and pistachio sausage, and a dessert of chocolate bavarois with banana liqueur ice cream and toffee sauce.

The award was the latest in a long series of wins for the Swindon chef, who last year won a bronze medal at the Culinary Olympics and took two gold medals in the Hotelympia contest in February.

The win also qualifies Mr Bowden to compete in the 2002 National Chef of the Year competition and his boss, Don Davenport, is expecting him to win many more prizes in future.

"Richard is extremely talented and passionate about his work, and we know he will do us proud," he said.