As Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cornwall's competition inviting schools to create a special menu for The Queen approaches its grand finale at Buckingham Palace in June, the first round of judging has taken place.  16 schools have been selected from over 200 entries to go through to the next round where their menus will be judged by Mark Flanagan, Royal Chef at Buckingham Palace.  The top four winning schools will be invited to Buckingham Palace in June to see their recipes prepared by the Royal Chef and will help serve them at a special reception attended by The Queen and The Duchess of Cornwall.

The quality of entries was staggeringly high.  This month we profile the sixteen finalists.

Pupils of Ashcombe Primary School in Weston-super-Mare suggested a 1950's themed picnic menu as their competition entry.  Enormous fun was had by pupils and teachers alike as they prepared and photographed their food before inviting members of the local community, the Head Teacher and a school governor to come and sample their efforts.  Their menu included diamond-cut cocktail sandwiches and mini scones with Devon clotted cream and Cheddar strawberries.

Brae High School in the Shetland Isles submitted a buffet style menu that enabled them to use a wide selection of local food such as fresh seafood, saucermeat, reestit mutton, handmade Shetland cheese and Shetland fudge.  The school named their proposed menu Shetland's Northern Delights, which included Princess Bannocks with reestit mutton or cheese; mini crab cakes known as Jubilee crab and Elizabeth shortbread, topped with local raspberries and cream.

Deliciously Yorkshire food! is the name of Roos Church of England Primary School's  menu.  The pupils went to great effort to incorporate local recipes.  They sourced crab for their Potted Tunstall Crab with a Wensleydale and Red Onion Pikelet from local fisherman Sean, whilst local butcher East Riding Pork invited the pupils into the shop to see how sausages were made so that they could create a wild sausage meat stuffing to go alongside a fillet of pork Wellesley.

When Highfield School in Wakefield, which is a Foundation Special School, heard about the Cook for The Queen competition, some of the pupils created a display to invite fellow students to enter.  53 of the 156 students entered in a huge display of enthusiasm. The pupils, many of whom had only limited understanding of the monarchy, were incredibly enthusiastic in designing their menu with highlights such as Queen Victoria sponge cake and Yorkshire pudding and roast beef.

Dedham C of E School in Colchester innovatively decided to theme their menu on traditional nursery rhymes that made references to Kings and Queens. Some examples of their dishes were I had a little nut tree (filo parcels filled with local asparagus, pear slices and grated nutmeg) and Sing a song of sixpence(baked slices of courgette and carrot - looking like coins - sandwiched together with English blue cheese).

Sun Hill Junior School in Alresford near Winchester used the first ever UK crop of locally grown Red Watercress to top their Lilibet Tarts - a puff pastry tart filled with Hampshire smoked trout pate. The children incorporated a lot of watercress within their menu as it is grown in Alresford.  They made great use of local producers such as The Alresford Chocolate Company.  Amongst other things, the chocolate was used in the Diamond Dunkers- chocolate biscuit diamonds sprinkled with edible diamond glitter and dipped into melted chocolate. 

Longhill High School in Brighton called their menu Crown Jewels and it was designed and created entirely by the students.  Highlights were Chocaflapastrabalicios - comprised of handmade chocolate truffles named Corgie Chocolates, Union flapjacks (flapjack squares iced with the Union Jack) and Sussex strawberries dipped in chocolate. Marmite and cheddar cheese scones known as Ma'amite Delights also featured on the menu.

39 ten and eleven year-olds from Carr's Glen Primary School in Belfast helped to create a menu of eight canape dishes that included mini Ulster fry, Irish stew fritters and Irish salmon with Fivemiletown Brie served on homemade soda bread.

Gresham's Prep School in Holt, Norfolk made use of an array of local produce including Great Snoring quails eggs, Sandringham chutney and Norfolk turkey to create their menu.  They also approached local Michelin starred chef Galton Blackiston to help judge their ideas.  Cromer crab and sampha cakes and Coronation quails eggs are an example of two items on their Norfolk on a Plate! menu.

Northampton is famous for its shoe industry heritage, so pupils at Latimer Arts College designed a special edible diamond slipper for The Queen and used the local cobbler scone as a base for many of their savoury dishes.  Footwear was not the only apparel to be edibly adapted, the students also proposed Jubilee jelly bonnets of raspberry jelly on a meringue base with edible flower and golden ribbon around the brim.

Rutland smoked trout fishcakes, mini ploughman's using Lincolnshire free range pork pie and Sparkenhoe Red Leicester cheese are just some of the items on the Diamond Jubilee Barnby Banquet crafted by pupils from Barnby Road Academy in Nottinghamshire.

Pupils at Eastington Primary School Gloucestershire enjoyed preparing local food for The Queen so much that they say they would like to do it every day!  The children loved researching the history of the Royal family to find names for their dishes which included Will's Spot of Windsor and Luv'lee Jub'lee Bub'lee.

Pencombe School in Herefordshire used their competition entry to not only celebrate the Diamond Jubilee but also the school's 150th anniversary.  The children researched what The Queen likes to eat and used this as the basis for their menu, which included Herefordshire russet apple puff and Wye trout mousse.

Pupils at Eton End School in Datchet used The Queen's ancestors for inspiration to create tantalising dishes such as Henry VIII venison and mushroom miniature pies and Queen Victoria's Windsor brown soup. 

Primary 7 pupils at St Columba's Primary School in Oban spent a great deal of time researching the history of royal food and banquets as far back as 1066.  They taste-tested their menu by inviting local community members who were Primary 7 age at the time of the Coronation to sample dishes such as figs with Argyll ham and Isle of Mull blue cheese.

Traditional Cornish pasties and Cornish sea salt crusted baked potatoes were just some of the items on the menu submitted by pupils from Cape Cornwall School in Penzance.  They also created a Commonwealth chocolate mousse that was made using chocolate produced by a co-operative in Ghana - one of the 54 countries belonging to the Commonwealth.

For more details on the finalists' entries please see: this link.

For more inspiring ideas about how to integrate British food into the Curriculum, see the Love British Food resource guide Putting the Ooo! back into food [click here]