Culinary program marks first anniversary

Donning chef hats and wide smiles, Winnipeg high schoolers showed off their culinary skills, such as making demi-glace — or, as one teenager put it, “a fancy gravy” — at a first-of-its-kind banquet on Thursday.

The feast was to celebrate the one-year anniversary of Culinary Connections, an after-school program organized by Red River College Polytechnic and the Winnipeg School Division designed to expose inner-city students to new recipes, skills and post-secondary training.

Students ages 12 and up cook alongside Red Seal chefs and peer-mentors on RRC Polytech’s Exchange District campus.

“My biggest dream is to become a cook, to work in a kitchen,” said Mihret Teklebirhan Measho, a Grade 11 student at St. John’s High School who put on a fine dining experience with classmates last week.

Mihret is among 150 students who’ve completed the 10-week program to date.

Previously, she had limited knowledge of cooking anything other than injera and Ethiopian sauces — staples in her house.

The 16-year-old said one of the most memorable moments this fall was learning to use a knife properly. She was able to share that lesson, among others, with her younger sister.

Culinary Connections was set up to build high school students’ basic skills and confidence on campus for three weeks before leaving their high school.

Each group spends the remaining seven weeks inside a commercial kitchen at RRC Polytech.

Participants are provided with bus tickets to get to and from Jane’s, RRC’s training restaurant. Following every three-hour class, each student leaves with a fresh-cooked meal and groceries to replicate it at home.

“Some actually cook a whole different meal later in the week, using those ingredients,” said Candace Rea, an experienced school leader who designed the program.

“We tell our students: that’s the resourcefulness we want to see. That’s applied learning.”

Rea left the kindergarten-to-Grade 12 system in 2023 to run community, education and youth initiatives at RRC Polytech.

A former adult education director, she has seen first-hand how missing meals can negatively affect student engagement and well-being.

Culinary Connections purposefully targets school communities where households are at a higher risk of experiencing food insecurity, she said.

Dozens of students from St. John’s and R.B. Russell Vocational School have taken part in the program since its inception.

Sweetpea Starr said he felt proud seeing his daughter, Ein, serving guests at Jane’s in a tall white chef’s hat Thursday.

His 16-year-old has prepared butter chicken at home in recent weeks, Starr said, noting that, thanks to RRC Polytech, she’s learned how to take apart a full raw chicken.

Despite a burnt caramel-related mishap, Ein said she’s thoroughly enjoyed herself.

“I’ve learned how to work with other people in the kitchen and work collaboratively… You have to keep an eye on things,” she said.

Mihret, Ein and their peers’ makeshift restaurant served mocktails, garden salads, alfredo pasta with grilled chicken and mushrooms, pork marinated with truffle potatoes and no-bake strawberry cheesecake.

Danier Audy insisted the sauces — including a pea purée and the demi-glace — were the highlights of the menu.

“We pour the demi-glace onto the meat — think of it like a fancy gravy,” the 17-year-old said.

Danier is in his final year at Sturgeon Heights Collegiate, where he takes vocational classes, but he’s been volunteering to help other students polish their chef skills.

Rea said the initiative, made possible through funding from Manitoba’s school nutrition program, relies heavily on in-kind donations.

The province earmarked $50,000 for its operations this year. In 2024-25, RRC Polytech and WSD received $30,000 to get the program up and running.

Advanced Education Minister Renée Cable was among roughly 50 diners who received both kitchen tours — students acted as guides as well as restaurant hosts and servers — and a multi-course meal.

In her brief remarks to the dining room at Jane’s, Cable told students and guardians that “post-secondary education is for you,” regardless of age and schooling level.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca