The next Iron Chef?

WASILLA — “Sixty seconds! Sixty seconds! Are your desserts on the table?”

A trained chef with a degree from the Culinary Institute of America in New York, Carolyn Frey prods the small group of aspiring cooks Monday afternoon in the Mat-Su Career and Technical High School kitchen.

It’s 3:15 p.m., 59 minutes after Rachel Quiriarte, Jessica Godden and Samantha Neukirch began preparing a three-course meal. On the menu is tomato and asparagus salad with mozzarella cheese, Maxwell Street-style pork chops with roesti potatoes and a fresh fruit tart.

The culinary creations are plated and rushed to the table and the critique begins.

“That doesn’t look clean and tidy,” Frey says about the plating of the pork chops.

Also, the recipe calls for julienned vegetables, which is a smaller cut than the students executed. With multiple presentations, the salads look good, she says.

“You guys were short one partner today, so you did a good job,” Frey continues with a wry smile. “I critique them, and I’m vicious.”

And she has to be. It’s less than two weeks until Frey’s culinary arts students put their skills to the test at the state Future Career and Community Leaders of America competition in Anchorage. Each team of three will have 60 minutes to recreate one of three menus. They won’t know which until the competition begins.

“We have the three menus and we’ve been practicing,” Frey said.

For the past two months, students have put in extra time in the school’s modern, professional kitchen. And for the past two weeks, they’ve been preparing the menus in the 60-minute window they’ll be required to in Anchorage

Flurry of focus

Quiriarte has finished peeling a large potato and begins shredding it through a box grater.

“Remember, it’s going to turn brown if you leave it sitting out too long,” Frey cautions. “So, I would not grate those right away unless you’re going to cook them right away.”

The students move quickly and sometimes erratically while they attempt to juggle multiple cooking tasks to bring their dishes to the table at the same time.

Neukirch wants to be a pastry chef and expresses good-natured frustration at making her first salad dressing — a vinaigrette for the tomato and asparagus salad.

“You can use any of those (oils) that you want,” Frey says. “I would recommend that you use olive oil and that you use apple cider vinegar. … When you make a salad, you don’t want to have to measure everything. Eyeball it. Remember, one part vinegar to three parts oil.”

Neukirch measures out the vinegar into a cup, then seasons it with crushed dried basil and salt.

“Yes, you want flavoring in there,” Frey coaches. “You don’t want just vinegar and oil, that’s boring.”

Today’s culinary arts students are far ahead of what their parents learned in traditional home economics courses, Frey says. At Mat-Su Career and Tech, the kitchen is top-notch and students are expected to develop their professionalism.

“Look at the equipment in here,” she says. “Everything you see is restaurant grade. We’ve got the walk-ins, which is standard, we’ve got the speed racks, overhead fans, sinks. We don’t have any what I call ‘Suzie Homemaker’ stuff. We have all commercial equipment here.”

The students also have a restaurant quality chef preparing them for the rigors of succeeding in a commercial kitchen. For those who believe the over-the-top tirades seen on television cooking shows like “Hell’s Kitchen” are an act, Frey says don’t be too sure about that.

“Oh yeah, it gets pretty verbal in (a restaurant kitchen), for sure,” she says. “You have to have a thick skin and you have to learn to respond appropriately. You can’t be adverse to being corrected. If you are, you won’t last long in the restaurant business.”

It’s a lesson Quiriarte, Neukirch and Godden say is well-received.

“It’s way harder than it looks on TV,” Godden says. “On TV, it looks all easy and it’s not always that easy. But I like the way this whole kitchen is set up like it is professionally.”

It is professional, Frey says, down to the white chefs coats and hats. After Monday’s practice, Godden was unfazed by the critique of her instructor.

“I actually like the criticism,” she says. “Then, I know what I’m doing wrong and I can fix it. Besides, I’m getting used to it.”

There’s a method to the hectic madness, Neukirch adds. “It’s her job to give us criticism. I’d rather get some criticism now than serve up something that gives someone food poisoning.”

Out of the frying pan …

As the practice session enters its final 20 minutes, the students begin preparing the main dish.

“What you’re doing is you’re burning the pan, right?” Frey observes. “So, you need to turn the heat down. What’s going to happen when you de-glaze that? You’re going to have a burnt sauce, aren’t you?”

Although the attention to detail may seem nit-picky, it’s necessary, Quiriarte says.

As part of the culinary arts program at the school, Frey’s four classes work on different parts of pre-planned menus, which are sold to people who pre-order the food.

Usually, the cost for the meals depend on the menus and ingredients, but is just about enough to cover the cost and materials to make and can range from $2 to $15 or more.

“We sell it as a dinner to go,” Frey says. “Every week or two we’ll come up with a menu. … For example, when we made seafood gumbo, we had crab and shrimp and scallops in there, so that was more expensive.”

But Mat-Su Career and Tech is a public high school, so where are the Tater Tots?

“You won’t see those here,” Frey says.

How about sloppy joes?

“You won’t see those here either.”

Although Monday was the first attempt at the German-style menu, the students are hoping for menu No. 1 — a Cobb salad, pesto stuffed chicken breast with confetti pasta and lemon tart with Chantilly cream.

“That’s my favorite menu by far,” Quiriarte says. “We’re pretty good at that one.”