‘I am overjoyed’
PAN 2024 champ Totlyn McDonald to set up brick and mortar following win
Published:Thursday | August 29, 2024 | 12:09 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Totlyn McDonald has every reason to rejoice after achieving first place in CB Food’s PAN 2024 competition on Sunday, where her passion for jerk-pan cooking went on display to help her win the competition’s $1 million prize.
McDonald, a 38-year-old native of Leith Hall, St Thomas, was one of 32 cooks from across Jamaica to participate in the annual contest, held this year at Independence Park in Black River, St Elizabeth. In addition to the $1 million prize, she won one year’s supply of CB Chicken, $100,000 from JN Money Transfer, one year’s supply of National Hardo Bread from National Bakery, seven cases of Red Stripe beer and a $20,000 gift basket from Walkerswood.
“I am the CB Chicken Pan 2024 winner tonight, and I am so excited. I am overjoyed, I am lost for words, and I was not expecting it, but there is going to be more regular ‘jerking’ in my future,” McDonald told Food.
“I have been making pan chicken for years, since 2017, and then I stopped, but since May this year, I started again more regularly. I have this building that I am working on for my planned business, but it is not completed and it is a work in progress, and now that I have won the $1 million, it would help me in completing that business,” McDonald added.
McDonald claimed the competition’s first-place crown following hours of test-tasting and deliberation by the contest’s judges. St Catherine native Kevin Smith claimed second place, while St Mary resident Hassane Gordon came in third.
McDonald also copped first place in the Grace Sauce Boss competition, where all the participants had to make their sauces using juices provided by Grace Foods. The second-place position for the Best Sauce went to fellow St Thomas resident Camille Brown, while third place went to St Catherine’s Karona Powell.
“My sauce is a pineapple-based sauce because Grace is one of the sponsors and they gave us things that you must incorporate in your sauce. I used pineapple juice as the base of the sauce, and I added other things to it such as ginger and pepper, to spice it up and bring up the flavour,” McDonald explained, sharing the secret to her sauce.
SECOND TIME’S THE CHARM
McDonald noted that her love for cooking stems from years of having cooked for her relatives, many of whom followed her to Sunday’s competition grounds. Her experience with jerk-pan grilling comes from her having previously entered the CB PAN competition in 2017, though she did not win at that time.
“I am always cooking at family events, and everybody always likes my jerk chicken, and they say ‘You could do this more often because we love it.’ So I just started doing it, but I stopped because I do baking and sometimes that takes up a lot of my time,” said McDonald.
“I entered this contest in 2017, and that is when I got my jerk pan from CB Chicken. That motivated me to start doing more jerking because I did not have a pan before,” McDonald continued. “I did not win any prizes at that time, because I did not really know much about jerking at the time. But since then, I have developed more and more skill about the jerking technique and the jerk sauce, and now I am victorious and happy.”
McDonald’s younger sister, Melissa McDonald, who served as her assistant during the competition, expressed joy at her older sister’s victory and at having been able to support her.
“I am very excited, and I do not even know if she is as happy like how I am happy. We came here together, and we are always together as a family,” said the younger McDonald. “We are trying to get our business up and running, as we cook and make juice, but it still wants a little more work. But with the love and passion we have for cooking and pastry work and all that, we will get there.”