Photo By Michael Strasser | Sgt. Maileny Frett, 511th Military Police Company, dices potatoes during a practice....... read more read more
FORT DRUM, N.Y. (March 2, 2018) -- The Fort Drum Culinary Arts Team is determined to prove that the months spent training and rehearsing their menus will be the recipe for success at the 43rd Joint Culinary Training Exercise at Fort Lee, Virginia.
Last year’s team finished second for Culinary Team of the Year, and the 10th Mountain Division (LI) chefs are looking to top that performance this time around.
Staff Sgt. Matthew Cordell, 10th Headquarters Special Troops Battalion, is the team manager and said that the chefs have designed a competitive array of menus certain to impress the American Culinary Federation judges.
“The goal of this team is to win Installation of the Year,” he said. “That’s been our focus and that’s what they’ve been training for all this time.”
Cordell said that the professional chefs bring a wealth of experience to the team, while the student chefs have demonstrated a willingness to learn and continued to improve every time they entered the kitchen.
“They’ve progressed quite quickly,” Cordell said. “They definitely want to win their categories, and you can see that as they work every day to improve their skills.”
New chefs join the team
Cordell said that Pfc. Mary Lewis, from I Company, 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, is particularly focused on one of her events, Student Chef of the Year, just to keep the title at Fort Drum. Spc. Huy Nguyen, from 1st Brigade Combat Team, won the event last year and is now competing as a professional chef.
“He has given me a lot of help, and I always ask him about everything,” Lewis said. “This is my first time competing, so I’m pretty excited about going. Honestly, I can’t wait. I just have to go and win now.”
Lewis also worked closely with Sgt. 1st Class Lagena Boggs, team captain and an experienced pastry chef from Headquarters and Headquarters Battalion, 10th Mountain Division (LI).
“I really want to be a pastry chef, so I’ve been learning a lot from her,” Lewis said. “They say it is really hard.”
Lewis said that she wanted to be a chef long before she enlisted in the Army.
“When I was little, I always used to cook for my mom and everybody,” she said. “It was something I always loved doing. My mom would work late, and I would just cook.”
Lewis said that the television was always on the Food Network, and she became inspired by what those chefs could do with food.
She will also join three other chefs for the Student Skills event. The first phase is an 80 minute, relay-style skills demonstration. One chef will butcher a chicken, another butchers a fish, then a third chef demonstrates knife skills on vegetables before the last team member prepares a pastry crust.
The knife skills appears to be the least favorite among the student chefs. It’s tedious, time-consuming work requiring a chef to peel, dice an onion, tourne eight pieces of a potato (each with seven sides and flat ends), julienne a potato and concassee two tomatoes. While a chef’s mind is entirely locked on the task, the body is hunched over the cutting board for an extended and back-breaking length of time.
Pvt. Arryamclaudine Monteza, from 10th Combat Aviation Brigade, said that the difficulty lies in cutting everything to consistent size.
“You spend a lot of time on that,” she said. “It affects not just your hands, but your eyes and your posture.”
Her top pick of tasks is fabricating the chicken because it is something she first learned from her aunt in the Philippines.
“My aunt loved to cook, and she showed us how to cut vegetables and things since I was eight,” Monteza said.
Monteza said that they trained to butcher a chicken under 10 minutes, and she usually clocks in around seven or eight minutes.
“We were told that some chefs can do it in three minutes,” she said. “You have to make sure that the carcass is cleaned because if it is not, you have to go back and clean it again.”
The second event of student skills requires the four chefs to set up their kitchen, then cook, plate and serve a four-course menu – a seafood starter, salad course, main course and dessert course. Teams are required to cook a pre-determined French classical dish – Ouefs a la Neige, or translated in English as “snow eggs.” This dessert consists of small poached meringues floating on a crème anglaise.
Lewis said that the team has practiced all the cuts and techniques so many times that it became muscle memory for them.
“Having to do it every day, we got used to it and it got easier. We have just gotten better at everything, from the cuts to cleaning as you go,” she said. “We can take all this knowledge with us back to the DFAC.”
Some student chefs noticed how their team transformed over the past several weeks from a gaggle of confused cooks to a well-oiled machine of perpetual motion.
“We really had to come together as a team, because if we don’t we won’t make our plates in time,” Monteza said. “Everything in the cooking phase is timed, and if we don’t help each other, no one is going to finish in time.”
Some of the events take place inside a field house where chefs will cook in front of an audience, as well as a panel of American Culinary Federation judges. Lewis said her biggest challenge will be settling her nerves.
“I’ll be nervous with all the people around us,” she said. “I feel like after I start, there will be no worries. I’ll be in my own zone, just cooking my food.”
Spc. Johnny Simmons, 10th Brigade Support Battalion, 1st Brigade Combat Team, said that he enlisted in the Army knowing he wanted to join the culinary arts team wherever he was stationed.
“I love cooking. I thought that if I joined the culinary team I would learn a lot of things that would make me a better chef,” he said. “I have always wanted to be a chef.”
Simmons displays a calm demeanor even when the clock counts down on a timed practice. He often asks others if there’s anything he can do to assist them.
“I’m still learning, and I want to learn more, but I also want to be a good team member and help when I can,” Simmons said.
As a child, Simmons learned how to prepare his first dish of scrambled eggs by watching his mother cook in the kitchen. Now he’s filleting a whole fish and preparing classical dishes, and Simmons is fascinated by the learning process.
“It feels good that I can learn these skills and do what I love doing,” he said. “I’m proud to be a part of this team – it’s a strong team. Hopefully, we can go down there and take gold.”
Perspective of the professional chefs
Spc. Raysean Lewis, I Company, 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, served as an alternate on the Student Chef team last year. Since then, he said that he worked hard to earn a spot on the Professional Chef team, but cooking at that level with such high expectations is like working without a safety net.
“It’s a complete change from last year,” he said. “Jumping from the basics that we learned last year to cooking as a professional chef, it’s a hard adjustment. As a professional, you’re expected to know more, and I’m still learning things like how to aspic food for the competition.”
Lewis said that experiencing the event before has made him more confident about cooking in front of the judges and a large audience. Lewis contributed a bronze to the team’s medal count (23) last year, and he is anticipating even greater results this time.
“I think that when we go there, this time we’re going to take it all,” Lewis said.
Nguyen also felt that the transition from student to professional chef was challenging.
“It’s a lot more work. It takes a lot more of your time and you have to think more ‘outside the box,’” he said. “You can no longer think like a student chef. Instead of doing a student chef-level technique on a plate, a professional chef learns how to elevate that to a higher scale.”
Nguyen said that it has also been challenging working without the constant guidance of senior chefs taking him step-by-step through his plates. That helped him prepare last year for the Student Chef of the Year category.
“Now I have to figure things out on my own,” he said. “It’s been good – I don’t ask for a lot of help, maybe every now and then. I feel that I have progressed a lot.”
Due to rule changes this year, team alternates cannot attend the competition, That means Spc. Craig York, 23rd Military Police Company; and Spc. Stephen Johnson, 110th Special Troops Battalion – both who served on the Students Skills Team in 2017 – will not be joining their Professional Chef team members at Fort Lee.
York said that the feeling is bittersweet, having advanced to the level of professional chef, but not being able to attend the event. Still, York and Johnson played a pivotal role throughout the training phase as they helped student chefs develop their skills and worked on cold food table menus.
“I’m helping out the team more this year by teaching the student chefs what I’ve learned, and hopefully they’ll go down there and win some gold,” York said.
York, Johnson and Pvt. Fernando Flores, from 10th Combat Aviation Brigade, also took on the challenge of being the team sculptors and were responsible for molding a giant block of tallow into a centerpiece for the cold food buffet table.
This is York’s third year contributing to the team centerpiece.
“I’m not great at it, but I know certain things,” he said. “I think we’re all pretty much working on this one equally.”
York said that there was some initial brainstorming as to what the centerpiece would be, based on the level of complexity. At one point, York said, they had reconsidered their decision for something much simpler – elegant and culinary-themed but they decided to keep challenging themselves. They ultimately chose something that invokes the proud history of the 10th Mountain Division.
York said that tallow is malleable enough to create a lot of detail in a sculpture. Most of the work can be done by hand, but the tools of the trade look similar to a dental kit with picks, scalpels, scrapers and other pointy objects. He said that tallow has the consistency of taffy and can melt if too much heat is applied.
“You have to make sure you don’t overwork it, or it can start falling apart,” he said. “You can apply heat to make something smoother or give it a glossy look.”
Johnson said that the pride he feels now surpasses the frustration he felt weeks ago. One particular design element was troublesome, and Johnson had tried using foam, then wood, to get the shape right. Eventually, he would carve it entirely from tallow.
“Let’s just say it was a headache for me and Flores,” he said.
“We’ve worked on it so many times – so many times,” Flores said.
Johnson said that one item took three or four days of work to perfect but it was worth the effort.
“People were laughing about how many times it took to get it right, but each time it kept getting better and better,” he said. “I’m really proud now.”
York said the biggest challenge comes when they have to pack the centerpiece because a lot of damage can happen between Fort Drum and Fort Lee.
“The only time we get nervous is when we have to transport the centerpiece,” he said. Every time, at least ten percent of it will get messed up – let’s hope not this year – but it happens every time. “That’s why we also take an extra box of tallow with us, so when we get down there we can fix what we need to fix.”
However, some things can’t be fixed on the fly, and York remembered one event where another team couldn’t lift their huge centerpiece of a mythical god onto the table.
“It looked pretty nice, but the team didn’t think about how they were going to get it on the table,” York said. “I saw about four or five team members lift it up, and as soon as they got it high enough over the table, it tipped over on its face. It was tragic.”
York and his Family will soon be leaving Fort Drum for Wiesbaden, Germany, and he said that he’ll look forward to joining Team Germany for the next culinary event.
“Throughout the years I’ve been doing this, I have had a lot of good mentors – some well-known chefs in this community,” he said. “I feel that if I don’t out there and give 110-percent in everything that I do, then I’m not living up to kind of chef they taught me to be.”
Sgt. Joshua Hoyt, 10th Mountain Division Artillery, said that even though everyone has a mindset of winning, the learning experience is equally important and, ultimately, the reason why they participate in the annual culinary event at Fort Lee.
“We, as chefs, are very competitive, but we love to share our knowledge,” he said. “You’ll see a lot of professionals walking around with binders – what we’ve done in the past, what we did that was successful, what wasn’t successful – and we pass that information down to the next group.”
This will be his seventh year competing at Fort Lee, and he said that it can feel like a reunion at times. It is his third time on the Fort Drum team, but he has also represented Fort Polk, La., and Fort Carson, Colo.
“There are chefs who have been doing it a lot longer than I have,” he said. “It’s become something I kind of look forward to every year. I get to see a lot of the people I’ve worked with at other places, and chefs I have gotten to know over the years.”
Hoyt has helped mentor the student chefs throughout the training, and has also assisted Boggs prepare for the Armed Forces Chef of the Year category by assembling some challenging mystery baskets for her.
The American Culinary Federation manual states that the mystery basket will contain two primary proteins, one of which is seafood, and two supplementary proteins. There are also four vegetables, one fruit, a starch or grain, and three other miscellaneous items. Chefs are required to use a portion of all items supplied to create a three-course menu. The format of the competition begins with 25 minutes for chefs to set up their station, then three hours of cooking time and 30 minutes to serve four portions of each course – allowing for 10 minutes per course. Chefs are also given 25 minutes to clean and clear the kitchen.
During one practice, Hoyt watched with joy as Boggs sort out the contents of a seafood-heavy basket. Among the ingredients were clams, round fish (Hawaiian kanpachi), lobster tails, radishes, lemon pudding, red lentils and melons.
“He loves to torture me,” Boggs said. “I’m a pastry chef, so I’m sure there’s stuff in there I’ve never seen.”
Although she has competed three times before, and has served on the U.S. Army Culinary Arts Team in national competition and the Culinary Olympics, this will be her first time vying for Armed Forces Chef of the Year.
Each professional chef is allowed an apprentice to set up and tear down the station, use basic knife skills for prep work, function as timekeeper, serve plates and keep equipment stored properly and in a sanitary manner. Boggs chose Spc. Nakeisha Williams, 23rd Military Police Company, as her apprentice.
“She’s learning about time management, mise en place, and also how important it is to be quick on your feet,” Boggs said. “It’s really a team effort because I’ve found that there are things she’s actually better than me with, and she’ll kind of whisper it to me.”
Boggs said that this is likely her last time competing, but she wants to end on a high note by helping her team earn Installation of the Year.
“I think we are all pretty confident, and determined that we can win this,” she said. “With anything, we know there’s the possibility that another team may come and blow everybody out of the water. There’s always the possibility that we may not win, but we’re going to go down there and do our best, no matter what.”
The first event at the 43rd Joint Culinary Training Exercise is the Armed Forces Chef of the Year category on March 9, and it concludes March 16 with an awards ceremony where the best chefs and teams will be presented with American Culinary Federation medals. Daily medal counts will be updated at www.facebook.com/army.culinary, and portions of the competition will be streamed live on Facebook.
| Date Taken: | 03.02.2018 |
| Date Posted: | 03.02.2018 14:40 |
| Story ID: | 267917 |
| Location: | FORT DRUM, NEW YORK, US |
| Web Views: | 162 |
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