Teen Chef Competition

By Ryan Christensen

Dressed in black and white checkered pants, wearing black shoes, white coats and white hats, it looked like a scene out of “Ratatouille.” Rather, it was, part of a national teen chef competition held by “the largest culinary school in the nation.”

The Art Institute of Salt Lake, located in Draper, UT is one of 30 other schools nationwide giving an opportunity to high school students to learn and compete for scholarship money and the chance to be “Intern for a Day” at the Food Network Kitchen in New York City.

The twelve students competing were pre-selected from a pool of 35 total entries who had all applied by submitting a food recipe they had created on their own. Most applicants were from Utah with a few students coming in from out of state.

Contestants were judged on ten different elements of cooking: knife skills, sanitation and safety, “Mise en place” (French for organization), cooking techniques, clean-up, food temperature, taste and flavor, texture and doneness, portion size and presentation.

Using these skills contestants were required to prepare a full course meal including shrimp cocktail, sautéed breast of chicken, fresh broccoli and rich pilaf.

There were three judges, Chef Frank Krause, Academic Culinary Director, Chef Kim Larsen, Instructor at the Art Institute, and Chef Bryan Wooley, Chef for Channel 2 news.

The first place winner, Chris Bramon, a senior from Missouri, received a $3,000 scholarship to the Art Institute of Salt Lake in Draper and will compete Las Vegas for the national prize. “It was great; really well organized. I had a great time,” said Bramon.