COUNTYWIDE : Looking for a Few Good Mess Cooks

The weapons were high-speed mixers, Cuisinarts and spatulas. The mission was to whip up the most exotic haute cuisine this side of Wolfgang Puck. The location:Tustin Marine Corps Air Station.

A Marine mess hall? The address on the press release wasn’t a mistake. On Thursday, 42 cooks from Marine bases at Tustin, El Toro and Camp Pendleton were applying the crowning touches to culinary creations that would tickle the palate of any five-star restaurant regular.

It was the eighth annual Culinary Arts Exhibition, a competition among Marine cooks to prove to themselves and anyone willing to take a bite that the corps has enlisted more than a few good cooks.

It’s no secret that military cooking has taken more than its share of criticism over the years. And those in the mess hall who plan, prepare and plop those hearty--some say mysterious--entrees onto hundreds of trays each day are more than a little miffed by the lack of respect.

“Day in and day out, mess cooks don’t get the respect they should,” complained Sgt. Paul Washington, the head baker at El Toro Marine Corps Air Station. “Most of the guys who eat in the mess think the only thing we can do is cook chicken three different ways or fry a jelly doughnut. C’mon, we’re artists. . . .”

To prove it, Washington was ankle deep in spent tubes of decorative icing which he had used on his creation, a “Day in the Park”--a lavish, white pound cake more 3 feet long and 2 feet wide covered with shaved coconut dyed green to look like grass. He built a teeter-totter, park bench and drinking fountain using edible gum paste.

The master touch was the pond in Washington’s park: a clear Pyrex bowl sunk in the cake and filled with water and two goldfish. Even the cake below the bowl was dyed blue.

“Tell me we can’t cook,” Washington remarked, smiling at the cake, which was large enough to serve about 300.

At the cavernous kitchen at the Tustin base, competing cooks--some huddled in teams and others working alone--looked as serious as Superbowl combatants. Some formed elaborate ice sculptures, including the Statue of Liberty and Batman, while others fashioned whales out of watermelons.

The exhibition was started eight years ago by the Tustin Chamber of Commerce, anxious to show its appreciation to the Marines for helping cook pancakes during the city’s annual Tiller Days celebration. The chamber still pays for the trophies, as well as most of the food used in the contest.

Winning isn’t everything, the cooks say. But it has to be mighty important, judging by Staff Sgt. Phillip Johnson’s entree in the seafood category. Johnson and his partner, Cpl. Clarence Green, created an entire tropical island scene. The ocean was various shades of blue gelatin dotted with snails, oysters and smelt. Cucumbers garnished with green peppers served as palm trees and coconuts cut in two were beach huts. Mounds of mashed potatoes formed the mountainous backdrop, and Johnson even fashioned cooking pots out of radishes filled with dry ice that appeared to be smoking.

Top-flight food, as military fare goes, is nothing new to the Tustin air station. In May, the 42-member mess hall staff was honored as the best in the Marine Corps nationwide.

But as any restaurateur will attest, for every satisfied customer, there’s one who walks out grumbling.

“Those cooks can win all kinds of awards, but unless they find a way to keep those French fries warm, they won’t win many fans on base,” one Marine said Thursday as he left the mess hall.

MARINE CUISINE

GROCERY LIST FOR MARINE CORPS CULINARY CONTEST

MEATS AND POULTRY

45 pounds of turkey 13 pounds of ham 20 Cornish game hens 7 whole chickens 1 rack of lamb 1 pork roast 1 pig’s head

SEAFOOD

16 whole crabs 12 lobsters 1 whole sea bass 2 6-pound salmons 30 pounds of medium-sized shrimp 15 pounds of jumbo-sized shrimp 5 dozen clams 3 dozen oysters 2 dozen mussels 1 dozen smelt 1 dozen snails 1 whole squid

Source: The Tustin Marine Corps Air Corps Station

BAKED GOODS

150 pounds of powdered sugar 90 pounds of white cake mix 50 pounds of shortening 15 dozen eggs

OTHER

$600 in assorted fruits and vegetables.

THE CAKE

Recipe for a 4-foot long, 3-foot-wide pound cake shaped like Batman and Gotham City. The cake:

40 pounds of white cake mix 6 dozen eggs Mix and bake at 450 degrees for about 40 minutes.

The icing:

32 pounds of powdered sugar 12 pounds of shortening. Assorted food colors Preparation time for baking and decorating by two cooks about 12 to 16 hours.

Serves: 400.