Lemon Greek Rice
Greek Seasoning
This recipe makes enough for several batches of rice.
Passing the Torch: Culinary Programs on Cape Cod Nurture a New Generation of Culinary Artists
Young people on Cape Cod who are planning for their future hear it all the time: Don’t go into the culinary arts, you can’t make any money. Then as a follow-up, they’re reminded of the long hours and the working conditions, described as demanding and draining at best, and toxic and misogynistic at worst. There is evidence that there might be truth to this portrayal if you listen to veteran chefs swap stories about the good old days when chefs would routinely throw pots at the kitchen help, or if you read the late Anthony Bourdain’s best-selling drug-infused, alcohol-drenched tell-all, Kitchen Confidential, or binge-watched The Bear, the award-winning television series set in a chaotic kitchen in a Chicago restaurant.
However, time spent with teaching chefs, culinary artists, restaurateurs, and hospitality professionals associated with three culinary arts programs on Cape Cod gives a more progressive impression. It appears there is a committed contingent of educators and professionals in the industry determined to bring change with the times, driven in part by generational values concerning work-life issues. But underneath it all, it is most definitely driven by seasoned professionals who wish not only to preserve, but advance and pass the culinary arts torch, something they cherish as dearly as family, to a new generation of chefs.
Photo 1: UCT’s Chef Joe Ellia shows students how to make sure every meal, even something as simple as a hamburger and fries, meets exacting standards
Photo 2: Chef Mike Otto leads a session on the food processor at CCCC.
Photo 3: Maeve West shows the concentration and steady hand needed to professionally decorate cakes and desserts.
Photo 4: UCT student line chef Andrew Norris during the lunch rush.
Linda Kelley was raised in the seafood culinary industry. Her father was a successful fishmonger in Boston, and her parents, after moving to Chatham in 1972, started their own seafood company in Harwich Port in 1976 that offers wholesale and retail seafood, as well as a takeout restaurant. She still works in the family business, and now after ten years as an educator at the Cape Cod Natural History Museum – and most recently for three years as a support aide – she is embarking on her first year as a culinary arts teacher at Cape Cod Regional Technical High School (CCT) in Harwich. With one instructor just retired and another who has left for the military, Kelley is single-handedly heading up the school’s program through transition. The school just hired two professional chefs to teach for the remainder of the year.
After working for twenty years as a chef and restaurant manager, Joe Ellia is well-known and respected in the local Cape Cod culinary scene. He is outspoken on the pitfalls of a life in professional kitchens based on job-related experiences with alcohol and depression. He’s like the person who walked two miles to school in the snow, and instead of saying you also have to walk two miles, he wants to make sure others don’t have to make that walk at all. Now, mindful of his own experiences, he teaches culinary arts at his alma mater, Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical School (UCT) in Bourne.
Like Ellia, Paul McCormick has returned to his alma mater as coordinator for the hospitality department at Cape Cod Community College (CCCC). McCormick began working in the industry as an eight-year-old washing dishes in his family’s two restaurants in Dennis Port.
Photo 1: Students like Haley Beaulieu and Jacob Burdette not only cook, they sweep floors, polish silverware, wash and fold towels.
Photo 2: The culinary arts faculty at UCT Back row, left to right: Culinary Arts Instructor Joseph Ellia, Dining Room Teacher Mari Pandiscio, Bake Shop Teacher Tom Pandiscio. Front row, left to right, Bake Shop Instructor Chef Haley Conant, Culinary Arts Instructor Abigail Pacheco.
Photo 3: The faculty and students in hospitality at CCCC: Standing left to right: Mike Otto, Bryan Clow, Sarah Bent, Sofia Olsen, Emma Busnengo, Victoria Miles, Nicholas Araujo, Paul McCormick. Seated: Matthew Sprague, Zach Teplansky.
Photo 4: Rachel Curran hustles an order out to the dining room at UCT during a busy lunch
When you see these three educators at work with their students, and when you talk to them about their programs and listen to them enthusiastically explain the rationale for what the curriculum is designed to do and how it is taught, there is no doubt they are invested in their students and personally dedicated to their achievements.
But let’s be frank: Educators are some of the most optimistic and positive people on the planet. You expect this from educators; it’s part of their profile. It’s when you see management out in the workforce also embracing the same values that you know that maybe something is up. A seismic shift. A bit of self-reflection, perhaps. Maybe they’re reading the handwriting on the wall other industries outside the insular world of culinary arts are seeing and understand that the world is not only changing; the train is leaving the station and it’s either get on board or get left behind. You hear it enough that you can’t help but take note.
There’s Nick Araujo, a student at Cape Cod Community College, who gave voice to every young person who has faced down the disillusionment of the go, go, go American lifestyle when he said, “There are lots of aspects of my life besides cooking and a professional career.” Friends and family were the first things he cited. He unequivocally stated that he wants to make enough money to live, and not have to work that hard.
And there’s Savannah Chadwick, a senior at Cape Cod Tech. She plays sports, sings and writes her own songs, makes art, and plays five instruments. She has worked in several restaurants and doesn’t want to be a chef. She likes to cook, just not professionally. Instead of culinary, Chadwick wants to go into law where she feels she can make a difference she can’t make in culinary. “I thrive in a positive environment, and restaurants can be tough,” she explained. “You’re constantly on your feet and bosses can be stressed and lash out. You can make a living as a chef, but it comes with a cost.” She enrolled at Cape Cod Tech because she wanted a more hands-on education than the traditional school setting she had received in grade school in the Monomoy school district.
Michael Pillarella, the Executive Chef at Wianno Club in Osterville is also President of the Cape Cod chapter of the American Culinary Federation, whose mission is to develop and promote professionalism in the culinary arts. “First and foremost, you have to look for a professional organization,” he would counsel young people starting out. “And that’s not culinary specific. That’s specific to any job you look for in any industry. If you work for a quality company, for example, Ritz Carlton, Hilton, or any company that has a respectable and high-quality reputation, you’ll be treated as such. If you work for one that has no respect for its employees, that’s how you’ll be treated.” But what if not every restaurant on the Cape got the memo that the world has changed and you can no longer treat the help like indentured servants.
This is where the schools and these professionals have stepped in to make change. They have their reasons. Chefs feel about culinary the same way Marines are dedicated to the corps. Cooking is more than a job; it’s a way of life. It’s being part of a big family, a word you often hear from culinary artists. “There have been twelve marriages between people who worked summers and about nine or ten kids from those marriages who came back to work,” said McCormick of his family’s Ebb Tide Restaurant in Dennis Port. “That’s what happens when you work as closely as you do in a restaurant.” “Every kitchen I’ve worked in was like a family,” said Ellia. “You work so many hours, a special bond develops in the kitchen,” said Chef Haley Conant, one of the culinary arts instructors at Upper Cape Tech. These people are not about to let a bunch of old-school knuckle draggers with their heads stuck in the last century besmirch their life’s calling.
The three schools offer programs designed specifically to help students on the Cape understand all aspects of a culinary business – soup to nuts, pun intended – in order to find work. Of the three, Cape Cod Community College is more business oriented. “The college is designed for those who want to open a restaurant or work in a hotel,” McCormick explained. “Our program offers a certificate as well as an associate degree that includes business subjects like management and marketing. Many students come in for the certificate program and switch to the associates program.”
Photo 1: The kitchen at UCT is as well-equipped, if not better, than any professional kitchen
Photo 2: UCT’s Bake Shop Instructor Chef Haley Conant gives students pointers on the best way to handle a pastry bag.
Photo 3: Crème brûlée, a classic French dessert made by one of the students at UCT
Photo 4: UCT student line chef Andrew Norris gives a final touch-up so meals are just right before being served
With the high schools being more immersive in culinary, each of the three programs still teaches students culinary fundamentals, from cooking and baking to how to fold a napkin properly, set a place at a table, and make a budget. The same light touch a baker needs to make a sugar crown on a crème brûlée is also required of a waiter when arranging flowers on each table in the dining room. Whether the dream is to open their own restaurant or bakery, be a line cook, go into management, or work the dining room, during the course of their training students must rotate through shifts in baking, line cooking, and front of house. The reason is so they become aware of the big picture in whatever kind of establishment they find themselves working. It’s so they become contributing team players in a multi-faceted process that demands communication and cooperation between the front of house and the kitchen to operate smoothly to ultimately serve the diner. “A person who wants to run a hotel still needs to know food,” said McCormick.
In the high schools, on the weeks when they’re not in the kitchen basically working a full-time job in the real world, students are studying academics: English, Math, Science, Social Studies, Business, Health, and Fine Arts. If it all sounds a bit grueling, it is. And it’s very competitive. At both high schools, incoming freshmen spend the first semester cycling through all the shops the school offers. If you have your heart set on culinary, you still need to explore each of the technical shops. Students make their top choices, then spend a full week in each of their choice shops, then their choices are pared down further. It’s not until the second semester before they’ll know if they’ve been accepted into the culinary program. If students think they can slide through the other shops while waiting to get into culinary, they’d be wrong. “They still have to behave in every shop; from the very start we look at a student’s character,” said Ellia.
Once accepted, the fun, as in the fundamentals, begins. Students are immersed in all aspects of the culinary arts. They learn competency on the intricacies of cooking, from how to measure ingredients and properly use a knife to how to bake and cost out a recipe. No job is too big or beneath students. They not only cook; they sweep floors, polish silverware, wash and fold towels, and clean grills after a turn as a line cook. They bake and decorate elaborate cakes and desserts that are then served to diners from the community in the schools’ dining rooms. They flip burger after burger over a hot grill, bake casseroles they’ve prepped, and stand all day in front of a pot patiently stirring chicken stock.
Bakers and line chefs are about as different in personality as siblings can be in the same family. Baking is slow and methodical. Line chefs, when working a meal, move fast and furiously. And not all students want to work in the kitchen. Many are drawn to working directly with diners. “I love talking to people,” said Grace Delore during a lull before the dining room opened at Upper Cape Cod Regional. “Hospitality students are different. I always joke they could talk the bark off a tree,” said McCormick. “They don’t always pay attention, but boy, are they creative. They think like artists. They are expansive in their thoughts.”
He continues, “I had a supervision class I had to teach. It was a required course for the business students, and an elective for hospitality students. I would set up Harvard Business Review questions, and the hospitality students could beat the pants off the business students because they are used to solving problems. In our business, you take the order, produce the product, deliver the check, and get paid, all in an hour and a half. Business students think, ‘I can order the sofa and I have six months to get it to the customer.’ Hospitality students are really good at thinking on their feet. If the customer doesn’t like something, they have to fix it right then.”
Knowing the fundamentals is, of course, necessary to get a job in culinary, but more is needed to get and hold down a job. “The characteristics of a young cook are no different than the characteristics of any well-behaved, respectable individual,” said Pillarella. “If you say please and thank you, if you treat people with kindness, those are the reasons you’re going to excel right now.” For these reasons, programs are now addressing the so-called soft skills.
Cape Cod Community College’s certificate program includes a class in human communication to improve interpersonal skills in a group setting. At Upper Cape Cod Regional, from day one respect is ingrained into the students. They’re taught to respect everything in the kitchen, right down to the floors and their uniforms, which they are graded on for appearance. “My goal is to give students the confidence and basic knowledge to do the job at hand. That includes people skills, how to write a resume, and go on interviews,” said Ellia.
Specifically for the Cape, Ellia says a good work ethic is important. “The Cape is seasonal. The Cape is one giant fishbowl; everyone knows everyone. Your name can go one of two ways. It can go positive when you do your work. Or you can burn bridges. You need good working relationships to make it on the Cape. I want them to leave the program as respectful young adults.”
But are there really jobs to be had on the Cape, where jobs spike for four months out of the year and schools churn out chefs, saturating the market? “Does the job market flex up in the summertime? Of course it does,” said Pillarella. “But if you’re a quality employee there is still a significant amount of work that is available. I have placed several of my employees at Wianno in jobs on Main Street in Hyannis that are open year-round. My network reaches from here all the way across the United States and down to Florida. There are two opportunities [during the slow season] for employees: They can go to school and our seasonality plays right into that, or they can pick up their wares and travel down to Florida and work at a top-quality country club or institution down there. They’ll get paid a very good wage, lots of benefits and bonuses, and can reciprocate between winter and summer properties, giving themselves a well-rounded education until they reach the point where they are considered for next level management and are offered a job year-round. If the employee is willing to learn, travel, and invest in their career, there’s a surplus of jobs.”
What if you’re not willing to travel and want to make a life on the Cape? Pillarella is adamant there are still jobs to be had on the Cape. “I go back to saying there are jobs on Main Street,” he said. “I have never had an issue placing a top-quality employee anywhere for a year-round position. There is such a lack of quality individuals that there is absolutely no problem.”
It is important for students to see all of their options, and that is what these programs are trying to do. “We focus on employability, but many of our students go on to college, Johnson and Wales, or the Culinary Institute of America,” said Kelley. “We’re trying to make a well-rounded culinary arts student who will have a variety of options.”
Photo 1: UCT students cycle through baking, line cooking, and front of house to gain an understanding of the entire operation of a restaurant.
Photo 2: There is a right and a wrong way to slice bread. Chef Mike Otto explains the correct way to Sarah Bent.
Photo 3: CCT’s Kannika Boot-in will attend Johnson and Wales upon graduation, and would like to open a bakery with a flower shop.
When it comes to colleges, one of those options for local students is Cape Cod Community College. “Many students when they graduate high school want to experience life off Cape Cod. They don’t realize the value at the college,” said McCormick. “If they came here for two years, they’d save so much money when they transfer to another college. Many of our students transfer to Johnson and Wales or the Culinary Institute of America after two years.” With CCCC coming in at just over $7,000 a year, and Johnson and Wales at almost $42,000 per year not including fees and housing, students transferring after two years can save upwards of $85,000 in tuition alone. CIA is almost $21,000 a semester without fees and housing factored in. For the cost-conscious, practical chef, Cape Cod Community College looks like a pretty good deal.
From the ranges of students interviewed for this story, their options are limited only by their own talents and imagination. Gino Nichols is already accepted to CIA; it was the only school he applied to. “I knew I had the skills and abilities to go there,” he said. He dreams of traveling the world, trying different foods, and opening his own Italian restaurant. “Real Italian, not Americanized,” he said. Machayla Plante is more interested in business and entrepreneurship and loves the idea of food trucks. Kannika Boot-in is heading to Johnson and Wales after graduation and is thinking of combining a bakery with a flower shop. Stephen Frazee would like to attend CIA but plans to enlist in the Coast Guard first; an enticing $70,000 signing bonus and a dearth of chefs in that branch of the military is his reasoning. Already Emma Busnengo, with her mother, runs their family restaurant founded by her grandparents, but clearly has bigger plans. “I feel I need the piece of paper to prove I can do it,” she said. “Our generation has to have a degree to get paid fairly.”
Whereas before, as long as you had a pulse you could get hired into a kitchen, now the torch is being passed to a new generation of culinary artists who are being trained in best practices in the schools, by professionals who believe the industry needs change. “We’re developing them into what they’d like to be, encouraging and inspiring and showing them the avenues of how to get there,” said Kelley. “We want them ready for anything.”
John Greiner-Ferris is a freelance writer and a photographer.
For more information about these programs, visit:
Cape Cod Regional Technical High School (CCT)
351 Pleasant Lake Avenue, Harwich
capetech.us
Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical High School (UCT)
220 Sandwich Road, Bourne
uppercapetech.com
Cape Cod Community College (CCCC)
2240 Iyannough Road, Barnstable
capecod.edu
American Culinary Federation Cape Cod & Islands Chapter
acfcapecod.com
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