Some of Amherst high school's best will join CIA

By Mary Carey
Staff Writer

Published on January 25, 2008

Culinary arts at Amherst Regional High School is not your grandmother's cooking class, and the proof was in the panna cotta at last week's restaurant-style lunch for faculty and staff.

Seniors in the culinary arts class also served homemade minestrone, corn chowder, broccoli and cheddar and french onion soups, with class-baked breadsticks, and an elegant salad sprinkled with golden beets - all for $5.

The food and presentation were impeccable - as well they might be. Students in the ProStart program, an elective course taught by David Jean, study the culinary arts for four trimesters, followed by an internship.

Upon completion, they receive certification by the National Restaurant Association, which administers the program. ProStart graduates can receive up to 15 college credits if they go to culinary school and are eligible for special scholarships.

There are five classes a week on subjects like customer relations, budgeting and market segmentation, besides the actual cooking students do. "It's really a management class," Jean said.

His goal is to open the lunches up to the entire community.

Some students plan to go to culinary college, the number of which has increased 60 percent since 1996, according to The Associated Press. The number of recreational cooking schools has tripled, a result, in part, of the popularity of the Food Channel and celebrity chefs, analysts say.

Aliya Bond, who became interested in cooking after watching a friend make gingerbread houses in the culinary arts classroom, has already been accepted to Johnson & Wales.

The training also comes in handy for students who don't choose a career in hospitality, Jean said.

"They don't start at the bottom of the ladder when they're looking for a job in a restaurant. With their certificate, it guarantees an employer a certain level of knowledge and expertise."

Jean, who began teaching at the high school last year, was a chef at the Village of Duxbury, a retirement community in Duxbury, before moving to Amherst. Before that, he worked with pregnant teens, teaching them consumer education and nutrition for 10 years at Crittenton Hastings House, in Brighton.

He also owns a cleaning business, called David Jean Cleaning Service.

An enduring passion

Some of the students always knew they wanted to cook. Others have recently discovered it.

"I love watching the Food Network. I love all the celebrity chefs. But personally, I grew up with cooking," said Samantha Lopez, who was greeting guests and taking money.

She plans to major in hospitality and hotel administration at the University of Massachusetts and perhaps go on to Johnson & Wales or the Culinary Institute of America. "I've wanted it for so long," Lopez said. "I remember in kindergarten, they asked me what I wanted to be, and I said, I want to cook.'"

Student Nicole Strangman also grew up around food, helping her grandparents cook big family meals. "Even when I was 5, I would roll out the pie dough," she said.

Nik Holm always liked being in the kitchen with his mother when she was baking, but he didn't get into cooking until the eighth grade after taking a cooking class at the middle school on his brother's recommendation. He took food classes at the high school, which do not place as much emphasis on the business aspects of cooking and in which the projects are simpler.

"No one is forced to take foods classes, but most of my peers have chosen to," he said. He would like to pursue his interest in hospitality at the Isenberg School of Management at UMass next year.

Ryan Oakes-Rooney, on the other hand, said he did not ask to take culinary arts.

"I randomly got switched into this last year. I like it, but I'm more into golf." He plans to study golf management next year in Florida. Still, he said, "I got to eat a lot of good food."

Mary Custard, dean of students, praised the presentation of last Thursday's lunch. There were fresh yellow daises in vases on vintage tablecloths and colorful Fiestaware plates. "It's a welcome break from our regular day," she said.

Several teachers said the chance to get together and eat a good lunch is rare. In some cases, they were meeting each other for the first time, not surprising at a high school with 220 faculty and staff members.

"If you think about a school environment, you're assigned to a certain spot," and faculty and staff don't get a chance to look around much, said Terry Leatart, who runs the study center at the school and was enjoying lunch with librarian Leslie Lomasson and Susana Brena, a bilingual tutor.

"The food is very good, but the social part is also very good," Brena said.

Christine Sonnhalter, an aide, was getting her food to go.

"This is fabulous," she said. "I wish they did this every day. You should have seen what we had last week ... acorn squash stuffed with turkey sausage and black beans."

"The students are great, and this guy," Sonnhalter said, pointing to Jean, "is doing a great job."

Mary Carey can be reached at mary.carey@att.net.