No reservations necessary.
Two groups of culinary students from the Monongalia County Technical Education Center are serving up their skills next month at the national ProStart Invitational in Maryland.
The competition will be April 26-29 at Marriott Baltimore Waterfront.
ProStart is the national culinary school that focuses on culinary arts and restaurant management.
METC’s Aiden Cole, Trey Blunt, Emily Cottrell, Johneveck Lopez and Bryce Thomas will represent West Virginia in the culinary competition.
Libby Bozic, London Dinkins and Enrique Leon of the tech center will compete on the management side of the event.
The restaurant management team was first in the state during ProStart’s recent West Virginia competition while the culinary students came in second in its statewide category.
It was an easy recipe to follow, said Chef Brian Covell, who advises the culinary program at METC, and is a past ProStart chef of the year.
“They’re a good group,” he said.
“They’re talented,” the former restaurateur continued. “They work hard and the skill level they bring is phenomenal.”
And, they aren’t the first from METC to go on the big culinary stage, Covell said.
“We’ve been sending our kids to nationals since 2010,” he said.
METC culinary students these days also go on the road with their own wheels.
The center is the owner of its own food truck, which is a key ingredient in the center’s “Country Roads Blazin’ BBQ” four-wheeled enterprise which is out and about across the school district.
Call it a fusion item on the METC menu. It’s a cross-pollination affair that stirs in all disciplines at the tech center.
That included the graphics students who designed the corporate logos of the corporate sponsors on the side of the truck.
HVAC students, also: They encased the truck’s heating lines for its grill in PVC piping — in order to protect the piping from road hazards.
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