Kitchen of Champions Culinary Training Program

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Livermore Food and Wine Festival

The Kitchen of Champions team spent the weekend of April 30th at the Livermore Food and Wine Fest cooking up brisket sliders and coleslaw for the public. We brought the SVdP food trailer down for a weekend of good food and informing the public about our program. The current Kitchen of Champions trainees got a chance to try their hand at working in a mobile kitchen. The customers loved the sliders and the students!

The menu!

Charlotte and Randy preparing the meat

The ladies of KofC

Randy, Charlotte, and Whitney... KofC rockstar students

Randy practicing his sales pitch

Charlotte and Randy awaiting the customers

Arthur slingin' those sliders

The event was a great way to raise awareness for Kitchen of Champions, and the students were able to practically apply their culinary knowledge they've learned in the program thus far. Win-win!

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Down on the Farm

The new class of students took their first field trip yesterday to two farms run by City Slicker Farms (www.cityslickerfarms.org), whose mission is "to empower West Oakland community members to meet the immediate and basic need for healthy organic food for themselves and their families by creating high-yield urban farms and backyard gardens." The urban farms and gardens we visited were full of fresh veggies, herbs, and fruit trees. Farm staff member Sarah Light gave the class a tour, allowed for tastings of many of the vegetables, and provided them with great information about organic urban farming.

The field trip was a great change of scenery for the students. The culinary curriculum they are learning at Kitchen of Champions is focusing on fruits and vegetables right now, so the experience was a practical way to apply what they have been learning in the classroom. They even got some fresh garden produce to take home. We all had a wonderful time down on the farm!

Friday, April 8, 2011

New Beginnings

We are so excited to have a new batch of Kitchen of Champions trainees! The 27th cohort of students started the program on Monday and have been getting acquainted with the kitchen and each other. The highlight of their first week was having the guys from Kitchen on Fire (www.kitchenonfire.com) come teach knife skills to the class. The students became pros at chopping, slicing, dicing, chiffonading, you name it in just a few short hours.

A huge thank you to Chefs Mike C. and Olive from Kitchen on Fire. You guys are welcome in our kitchen ANYTIME!

Monday, March 28, 2011

Farewell KofC Cohort 26!

Long time no post! Thanks for being so patient, Kitchen of Champions blog followers. We have had a lot of activity within the KofC program the past couple weeks. Here is a taste of what we have been up to:

Last week, the students of Cohort 26 prepared an extravagant graduation feast with the help of Guest Chef Elka Gilmore. They did a trial run of the meal at the beginning of the week to practice both the cooking techniques and ServSafe practices involved.

The actual graduation ceremony was on Thursday evening, March 24th. The keynote speaker was Mark Everton, General Manager of the Waterfront Hotel at Jack London Square. The students and culinary staff went all out to serve what may have been the best graduation meal in the history of all SVDP graduations! Each student prepared their signature dish, and no guest left with an empty stomach.

For the final day of class, the students and staff took a field trip to Holy Names University in Oakland. The students got a grand tour of the kitchen and dining hall facilities, and everyone was treated to lunch. It was a great way to spend the last day together as a class.

Congratulations Cohort 26, you guys are great!

We are almost finished recruiting the next class which will start April 4th. Stay tuned for updates!

Friday, February 4, 2011

Kitchen of Champions Update

Sorry for the infrequent blog updates, folks! We will be keeping the blog alive but please head over to our Facebook page to hear a more steady stream of consciousness from the Kitchen of Champions Culinary Training Program. Thanks for the continued support!
Kitchen of Champions on Facebook!