Compost just desserts for school

Chocolate and garden compost do not usually belong in the same sentence - but it was a couple of decadent chocolate desserts, made by local a mother and son team, that helped get a tiny South Wairarapa school its own composting system.

Tuturumuri School principal Lisa Malones, and her son Ryder Picknell-Malones entered the inaugural Great Tora Cook Off on Queen's Birthday Weekend, and emerged victorious in the Desserts and Kids categories respectively.

The cook off, the brain child of local gardener Anne Dodds, was set up to raise funds for a macrocarpa composting system for the Tuturumuri School gardens and for new gardening equipment.

Ms Malones and Ryder (11) were happy to get elbow-deep in chocolate for the school's 17 pupils - and the wider Tuturumuri community was quick to chip in with its own recipes.

"There were 65 entries all up, and over 100 people turned up on the night," says Ms Malones.

"That doesn't shock me at all. There's such a great community spirit here. Everyone in the community is connected to the school in some way."

In all, $800 was raised for the school.

Ms Malones' winning entry was a chocolate cake, which she said was a "secret family recipe".

"It was passed down to me by my mum. And now Ryder's making it," she says.

She decorated the cake with an image of the Tuturumuri School logo - a windmill under a rising sun - using buttercream icing, with each detail individually piped using an icing bag.

"I think the judges really loved that. The cake tastes great, but it was the school's logo that really spoke to them."

Not to be outdone, Ryder made a rich chocolate mousse, with raspberries hidden at the bottom - which won him a copy of the Edmond's Beginners Cookbook.

Ms Malones said she first started baking when she wanted to try her hand at making her sons' birthday cakes - and, while she confessed being "hopeless" at first, she was soon putting herself through university with her brightly decorated delights.

Ryder has been interested in cooking from a very young age, making waffles for his family before he was tall enough to reach the mixer.

"He's been cooking since he was three," says Ms Malones.

"He's been sitting at the bench watching me in the kitchen since he was a wee bub. He's making cakes now - he loves playing around with all the icings.

"He made a cake shaped like a Chrysler Mini the other day. It looked really spunky."

Ms Malones, who came to Tuturumuri from Paekakariki School on the Kapiti Coast, loves baking with her pupils - and hopes they too will catch the baking bug.

"We made cookies last week, waffles the other week, and doughnuts the week before," she says.

"The kids take the recipes home with them - it's great."

Ms Malones said the school was planning to run the Great Tora cook off next year, and hoped to make it "bigger and better."