Cullenary CTE

 Soren Skinner is a Culinary Arts major and is in his second and last year of his degree. When he gets his degree he wants to open his own restaurant. This program is helping him fine tune his skills in cooking and management. How COVID has affected this program is that it's affected the organization of the kitchens. Skinner says, “It's impossible to fully teach culinary arts online.” Since March of 2019 when everything shut down because of COVID things were hard for everyone. But since October of 2020 things have gotten better with trying to organize, learning online, and more. 

The biggest challenge is the change of pace from high school to college, like the sudden  long hours on their feet. It's also a hard way to learn and some people get cut from the program. Some big highlights are that the students have free reign of what they want to make in their rotations, and also the banquets that happen three times a year. During the banquetes there is a lot of food being made inspired by many different regions and provinces in the world. The banquetes also give them memories and an experience for future events either in college or in life when they open or manage a restaurant. 

In this program, they were taught not only how to do things, but also why it was important to do them a certain way. Soren says, “Why vinaigrettes work, why bread is such a fickle creature, why meat behaves in a certain way.” Once the students are taught why things are done it clicks differently in their mind instead of being told what to do and how it's done.

For future students Soren said to not give up even when it gets hard. Sometimes you will want to pull your hair out, but you have to keep trying and stay organized because that will help you. 

Aiden Nielsen is a culinary student who is in his second and last year of the program. He decided to go into the CTE culinary arts program because he has always had a passion for cooking and he wants to take a leap into the STEM program at OSU. 

COVID has changed the program so much, they can’t have any people in the cafeteria like they could before covid and they can't have a full production crew in the kitchen either. All the students have an online order form that they can give the chefs to order the product for their dishes. 

When the students first when into this program as first years they were learning basic skills and using those skills for mass production, but now as second years they are honed on fine tuning their skills, regions, and learn how to cook on the line at the Santiam Grill, which now with COVID the second years can’t do it anymore. 

Some of the biggest challenges are time commitment because some days you are there for normal times where you're in the kitchen and some days Aiden is there from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Some of the biggest highlights are that you can bond with your classmates and instructors. 

There are a number of benefits to joining the CTE Culinary arts program. Like Aiden, he is the president of the culinary club that they have and he has the opportunity to go to different locations and meet different chefs, farmers and more. 

For future students who are thinking of going into the CTE culinary arts program Aiden has suggested to make the most of your time and get involved in things. It also helps if you make connections with your classmates and teachers and get every little bit of knowledge that you can that will help you in the long run.