Head chef of Northampton restaurant takes home East Midlands ‘Chef of the Year’ award

The head chef of a Northampton restaurant has been named ‘Chef of the Year’ in the East Midlands at this year’s Bangladesh Caterers Association (BCA) Awards.

Shamim Chowdhury, who has been the head chef at Aramintas, in Wellingborough Road, for the past five years, competed against 40 chefs in a cooking round and was shortlisted in the final 10 ahead of his win.

Shohid Islam, owner of Aramintas in Wellingborough Road, said: “This award win is a huge honour for Shamim and is testament to his hard work over the years. He has been dedicated to this industry for the past 20 years, working his way up from junior to head chef, and brought the win back to Northampton.”

In the live cooking round, Shamim had to make his signature dish, which was ‘seabass exquisite’ – a customer favourite at Aramintas, which has been serving Northampton for the past 23 years. With such a huge number of entries and still having to compete against 39 other chefs when many were eliminated, Shamim and his team were shocked that he took the top spot at the 16th annual BCA Awards.

“We want to make Northampton the leading area for curries,” said Shohid. “We’ve worked hard to create signature dishes that are reminiscent of Bangladeshi culture and put Northampton on the map.”

These dishes include chicken hario kursani and lamb shatkora, available to order off of Aramintas’ menu.