Food Bank of Delaware celebrates second culinary graduation at Ferris School

January 23, 2018

Six students successfully completed the Food Bank of Delaware’s culinary training program at the Ferris School. Their accomplishments were celebrated today at a luncheon honoring the students.

Today’s graduation ceremony marks the second graduating class of this partnership with the Ferris School for Boys. The first ceremony took place in November.

The students have spent the past nine weeks with Chef Instructor Sean McNeice learning the basics of the culinary field. The students received ServSafe instruction and learned more about preparing stocks, soups and sauces, other cooking methods, baking, professionalism, kitchen and food safety, customer service, hospitality and more.

Chef Sean enjoyed working with the class and encouraged students to always do things correctly. “If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing correctly,” he advised.

Students showed off their newly-developed talents by preparing lunch for guests. The menu included sesame chicken, Hot Cheeto shrimp alfredo, bacon cheeseburger sliders, quinoa pilaf, biscuit donuts, stuffed caramel apples, coffee cake with jam and brownie cookies.

Since the start of the partnership with the Ferris School, Food Bank of Delaware Food Service Coordinator Greg Coumatos also started teaching an afternoon Cooking Skills for Life class in mid-November at the school. The program is designed to provide cooking skills training that is primarily utilized by students in preparation of food for a household, giving them skills in how to budget, shop and prepare healthy affordable food for themselves and their families.  They receive instruction in nutrition and knowledge of foods, budgeting, safe food handling, food preparation and safety, basic cooking skills and career paths in the food service and hospitality industry.

Check out lunch prepared by today’s graduates!