Best Fruit Carver — Chef Lin Repko
At Sandusky’s Rockin’ Ranch, chef Lin Repko transforms ordinary produce into extraordinary works of art, continuing a fruit-carving tradition rooted in her Thai family.
At Rockin’ Ranch Saloon and Event Center in Sandusky, Ohio, cowboy boots and pad thai share the same floor. Chef Lin Repko commands the kitchen, whipping up pulled pork and cheeseburgers with the same ease as the Thai dishes she grew up on in her hometown of Bangkok, Thailand. Her real showstopper, though, is fruit carving, where she turns melons and pineapples into fanciful creations, such as flowers, bunnies, cars, even dragons. Carrots become articulating tails, tomatoes turn into roses and apples become flower blossoms or ducks. Repko wasn’t taught in a classroom; the skill was passed down like an heirloom. She learned by watching her mother, who carved for Thailand’s royal family, continuing work her grandmother had done before that. rockinranchohio.com
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