Duluth East culinary students prep for statewide competition

DULUTH, Minn. — For the second year in a row, students at Duluth East High School are partaking in the Minnesota ProStart Invitational Culinary Competition.

“The students get two butane burners, they get no running water, no electricity, and two eight-foot tables, and about an hour to cook. So it’s kind of like a Chopped competition,” Adam Wisocki, Duluth East Culinary Arts Instructor, said.

This year, Duluth East has two teams competing, and one of the team captains, Ethan Christensen, is prepared for an intense hour of cooking.

“If you’re not already pre-programmed and stuff, and have backlogs of things how to do them in case things come up, then your whole group can come to a halt, and then it’s just in a really bad situation. But overall really stressful, but some of that stress does lead towards the fun,” Christensen said.

With the competition right around the corner, students are finalizing plans for their three-course meal.

“One of them is an ahi tuna spring roll, which is our appetizer. The entrée it’s a deconstructed lamb stew from the Middle East Greek area, and then we have a dessert which is a Greek cheesecake with pistachio crust and a lemon vanilla filling,” Christensen said.

The event sees the best young chefs from around 15 schools across the state.

“It not only introduces them to industry leaders, great chefs, but also that experience that as a high school student being able to be in this environment, in this high-paced industry, that they wouldn’t necessarily get that opportunity unless they were actually working in this industry,” Wisocki said.

Duluth East has various cooking classes, giving students hands-on experience.

“You get to go on a lot of field trips and explore new things and just get to experience things that you wouldn’t normally in a normal English or math class, for example,” Christensen said.

The advanced cooking classes get to use commercial equipment and have access to various ingredients.

“A lot of the ingredients I would have never heard of before joining this, like a lot of the different spices that we have in the back there, I would not have ever thought of that kind of a thing, and just being able to play around with those is really cool,” Christensen said.

The program at Duluth East teaches valuable skills, even for students not continuing on a culinary path.

“I think this is one of those industries where you get this whether you’re a dishwasher, prep cook, a line cook. It teaches you organizational skills. It teaches you how to work with a group of peers,” Wisocki said.

The competition takes place on March 12 in St. Paul, Minnesota.

The winners will represent Minnesota at the nationals in Baltimore, Maryland in April.