Another exciting event unfolded last January 24, 2014. The director of First Gourmet Academy Mats Loo was invited to visit Malacañang Palace for a brief meeting with the king of Sweden King Carl XVI Gustaf. Since Malacañang knows (please read more about this in this link) that the director of First Gourmet Academy is Swedish, it was considered a good idea for a Swede based in the Philippines to welcome His majesty. Mats was also allowed to bring one of his students to this occasion.
The main reason behind the visit was for the king to attend the International Boy Scout jamboree that took place in Mt. Makiling over the weekend. The Swedish king also visited disaster-struck Tacloban to inspect the relief efforts taking place after Yolanda. The first thing the king did as soon his plane landed was to pay a courtesy visit to Malacañang palace to meet President Aquino.
“As a Swedish national it was for sure a big thing for me to meet my king,” Mats Loo says. “He was interested to know more about First Gourmet Academy. So I told him very briefly about our culinary school and the program we offer to our students. I also informed him that we actually teach some very classical dishes like Swedish meatballs and Swedish pea soup.”
