The Young Escoffier High School Culinary Scholarship Competition has been going on for 10 years. The high school level cooking competition is held at the Auguste Escoffier School of Culinary Arts in Boulder, Colorado. Each year, culinary teams from around the Rocky Mountain region compete in an hour long competition. This year, 12 teams competed for a total of $60,000 in scholarships to attend Escoffier’s culinary school.
This was Laramie High School's fifth year competing in the competition and is the sole high school invited from Wyoming. KallieDee Poncelow, the culinary instructor at the school, said six of her former students have attended Escoffier.
“Being able to provide these kids with skills that they can go on and go to culinary school or even get jobs in college within the restaurant industry, I think, is really awesome,” said Poncelow.
Ponecelow teaches Prostart. The program is run by the National Restaurant Association. The program gives high school students professional experiences to prepare them for entering the restaurant and hospitality workforce. It’s a two-year class.
“They essentially get the first year of culinary school,” said Poncelow.
The advanced Prostart culinary class goes to the Young Escoffier competition. It’s meant to mimic a professional kitchen, with emphasis on students' handling of safety and sanitation.
“They need to know and understand that we are dealing with people’s lives,” said Escoffier’s high school liaison, Chef Steve Harden. “The idea is the opportunity to experience and learn and then to go into the industry and hopefully change it.”
The six students who competed this year received positive feedback on their communication and teamwork skills in their rubrics.
“They were the only team in the kitchen you could really hear, and that’s a big sign of respect in a kitchen,” said Poncelow.
All competing teams were asked to prepare the same three dishes with prearranged sets of ingredients. This year's selection included Chicken Fricassée, Rice Pilaf and a Niçoise Salad. The teams were then graded by Escoffier chef instructors on their sanitation, safety, teamwork, timing, technique, plate presentation and creativity.
Laramie High School Senior Dylan Jones said judging emphasized the team's ability to stick to the recipe.
“I think that’s where we started to fall off, because we are all pretty creative and independent and we usually have trouble sticking to rules,” said Jones. “We felt we’d rather just put our flair on it and make what we felt was deserving rather than just what was put on the paper,”.
The two seniors who spoke to Wyoming Public Radio did not express interest in attending Escoffier’s culinary school but did emphasize how the experience has grown their confidence and enjoyment of food and cooking in a kitchen.
“I really like eating food and I think being able to cook is a really important skill, whether you do it for your job or not,” said Owen McLaughlin, a Junior on the team.
The team is now moving on to national competitions.
