A one-week internship during junior high school at the restaurant of Arne Brimi -- the first Norwegian cook ever to enter the Bocuse competition -- gave Even Ramsvik his first taste for the culinary trade.
"That made me hungry for more," says the 26-year-old chef from northern Norway.
Mr. Ramsvik's dream is to win the Bocuse himself. He placed second to Gunnar Hvarnes this year for Chef of the Year -- the competition that determines the country's Bocuse candidate -- on just his first try.
Mr. Ramsvik won gold medals in the World Cup in Luxembourg and in the Culinary Olympics in Erfurt, Germany. He was working as commis, or apprentice, at the Gastronomic Institute in Oslo, now known as the Culinary Academy of Norway, when he won the Linie Award in 2005, one of the most prestigious in the Nordic region.
The Linie prize catapulted Mr. Ramsvik's career with an internship at three-star Michelin restaurant Auberge Le Clos des Cimes in France. He ended up staying three months longer than planned and still aspires to work abroad. But his destiny seems to be in Oslo. He worked two years at Palace Grill and one year as co-chef at Restaurant Oscarsgate when it gained its one Michelin star in 2008.