Culinary Student Qualifies For State Competition
Payton Shrock, a senior at West Noble High School, was one of four culinary arts students from the Wawasee Area Career and Technical Cooperative to compete in a SkillsUSA Indiana regional competition Saturday and he qualified for the state competition in April.
It was the first time for the cooperative to compete in such a competition. Dan Bauer, culinary arts instructor and who teaches the classes at Wawasee High School, said the students did not know the menu until they started in the kitchen. They were scored on safety, sanitation, preparation temperatures, time management techniques, knife skills, following recipes, product appearance, presentation, taste and garnish.
They had four hours to prepare a complete meal for two including vegetable salad with balsamic dressing, sausage and potato soup, stuffed chicken with roasted red pepper sauce, wild mushroom polenta and glazed carrots and pearl onions.
Saturday’s regional competition for Region 2 was held at Ivy Tech in Fort Wayne. The region consists of 15 counties in the northeast section of the state. Students must place in the top five in order to advance to state. The state competition will be held April 10-11 in Indianapolis.
Other students competing from the Wawasee cooperative included Emily Rodes, Wawasee; Grace Heckman, Fairfield High School; and Austin Evans, Fairfield.
SkillsUSA is an applied method of instruction for preparing workers enrolled in public career and technical programs. It serves high school and college students, along with professional members, nationwide who are enrolled in training programs in technical, skilled, service and health occupations.