Culinary students earn heaping helpings of awards

by Dennis Dalman

editor@thenewsleaders.com

For the ninth year in a row, teams from the Pro Start Culinary Program from Sauk Rapids-Rice High School have been cooking their way to award-winning glory in one contest after another.

And their meals aren’t exactly Spam hash, canned beans and Jell-O dessert – far from it. The dinners sound more like something served at the White House for important visiting dignitaries. How about a first course of maple-glazed salmon over pickled vegetables and a beurre blanc, followed by cranberry-stuffed duck breast with potatoes, julienned carrots and a red-wine-reduction sauce? For dessert, why not a syrup-immersed almond cake with peach-and-berry coulis on a sugar nest and whipped cream?

That three-course dinner, cooked by SRR Team 1, earned third place at the Minnesota ProStart Invitational state competition March 10 in Moundsview. That same team took first-place honors a couple weeks earlier at Brainerd in Grandview Resort’s Culinary-and-Wine Competition. The members of Team 1 are Hanna Meyer, Julianna O’Mara, Abby Schiller and Shae Waseka.

The Moundsview competition was extremely intense and even grueling, considering each team had only 60 minutes to prepare their three-course dinners and was limited to using two butane cooking burners and no electrical equipment. Those restrictions were meant to create and level the competitive field by students from all schools, some of which have elaborate cooking equipment, some with just the mere basics.

At the Moundsview contest, there were two SRR cooking teams competing. Team 2 created a three-course dinner of scallop ceviche, pan-seared duck breast with plum sauce and rice cakes with exotic names. Team 2 is comprised of members Sawyer Amo, Emma Ditlevson, Daighton Ripp and Paige Vogt.

The third team in competition, the Management Team, included two members from the two cooking teams (Meyer, Vogt). The Management Team took first place in Moundsview and will compete nationally at Grapevine, Texas, April 27-May 2. Its members are Marianna Blair, Kelsey Christenson, Meyer and Vogt. For their champion win, the team presented to the judges written and oral concepts for a menu plan, décor, plans for a menu concept, price structure and marketing – all centered around healthy pasta dishes with herbs.

Remarkably, the SRR ProStart Culinary Program’s Management Team has won awards in state competitions ever since the school’s program was founded nine years ago.

In early December, the SRR program was named to the Elite 50, an honors list recognizing the top 50 Pro-Start culinary programs in the nation.

In all of the last nine years, SRR ProStart teams have placed second or third, at least, in every contest they entered, as well as first-place wins.

ProStart is a two-year elective high-school culinary course whose students are eligible for competitions and scholarships from the food industry. They can also earn credits for post-secondary education.

The course instructor is Mary Levinski, who also serves as coach for the competitions. There are currently 135 students in the program. When the course began in 2007, there were only 18 students registered. It has grown by leaps and bounds ever since.

“It’s so much fun; I love it,” Levinski said. “It’s amazing how creative these students are.”

ProStart allows students to work with chefs and to take field trips to restaurants, colleges, food vendors and food shows. In addition, ProStart is socially connective, and its students do some catering now and then to raise money for good-cause programs such as United Way and Ronald McDonald House.

ProStart began when the National Restaurant Association realized the need for the development of food-service and food-management skills among young, up-and-coming students who would soon enter the work force, including jobs in the food industry. The association then began to promote ProStart courses to high schools in all 50 states. SRR decided to start one at the high school.

And that’s where Levinski came in. She jumped at the chance to teach the program because she had always loved working with young people.

Born in St. Augusta, Levinski earned a degree in family consumer sciences at LaCrosse (Wis.) University. She taught for two years at a high school near Ashland, Wis., then worked for six years in 4-H Extension service, after which she taught at Kimball High School before being hired at Sauk Rapids-Rice High School in 2000.

Levinski said when students first start their SRR ProStart classes, many dislike some foods intensely, such as onions or mushrooms. However, as they begin preparing dishes using those – and other – ingredients, most students at least try to eat what they thought they hated and most decide such foods are, if not among their favorites, at least OK, Levinski said.

Early lessons in ProStart involve basics such as safety sanitation, ways to prep food, making stocks and sauces, and cooking methods. Once the students have mastered those basics, the rest is the sky’s the limit, and many students excel to such a degree they bring home heaping helpings of awards, year after year.