CATEC Thanksgiving fundraiser aims for perfection

By Brandon Shulleeta

Published: November 27, 2008

Pumpkin cheesecake is the easiest thing to cook but “the hardest to get perfect,” said second-year culinary arts student Michael Baber as he spread icing on one of the last pumpkin cheesecakes he’d be cooking for Thanksgiving.

As it turns out, “perfection” is what his instructor, Bob Bressan, was looking for.
Culinary arts students at the Charlottesville-Albemarle Technical Education Center were tasked with cooking fresh quality Thanksgiving food from scratch and dishing it out in a hurry, for a fundraiser. They filled more than 150 orders.

Profits will go toward new equipment for the culinary arts program and to help finance second-year students’ upcoming trip to the New England Culinary Institute, Bressan said.
“I also use it to teach the kids,” said Bressan, who students say runs a tight ship. “They put a lot of the culinary principles into practice.”
Students cooked turkey, three kinds of stuffing and mashed potatoes, for example, as well as apple and coconut custard pies.
Since the labor was free, an item that would cost $9 or $10 elsewhere was sold for about $7.50, Bressan said. Two pounds of all-white meat roasted turkey breast was sold for $13.95. A two-pound fresh mashed potato casserole was $6.75.
Baber, 17, said he plans to become a pastry chef, and said preparing the Thanksgiving meals was “as close as you can get” to working at a traditional bakery and dealing with customers.

Students cooking on Thanksgiving Eve said they’d started their days as early as 5 a.m. and were still recovering from the chaos of having to cook quickly, despite high expectations for quality.
“One year we’re going to get perfection. Each year we get better,” Bressan said. “We put out a pretty darn good product.”
This is the seventh year CATEC has done the fundraiser. In addition, two meals are given to the Albemarle County Police Department each year to donate to needy families.
Bressan said he’s been trying to get his students more involved in the community. He requires first-year culinary arts students to volunteer 50 hours of community
service and catering, and 75 hours for second-year students. They volunteer with groups such as Habitat for Humanity and
The Salvation Army, he said.

Many of the students, some of whom plan to attend culinary institutes, hope to work in the field professionally.
Heather Morone, a 17-year-old first-year student, said she has wanted to become a pastry chef since she was 10 years old and said that the Thanksgiving fundraiser helped her get a good taste of the hard work required.
“You come home, your feet hurt,” Morone said with a smile, adding that while she’s cooking the food she’s wishing to eat it herself.
Those who ordered food had to do so by Nov. 19. Bressan said customers ordered about 750 food sides, about 250 to 300 more than last year.