NHS Students Learn Industrial Culinary Skills

Newsberg will feature one of the nine career and technical education (CTE) pathways offered at Newberg High School, including culinary management, carpentry and construction, agricultural technology, business, digital arts, education, medical sciences, performing arts, and integrated manufacturing.

This month’s feature highlights the industrial kitchen and culinary management program.

NEWBERG, Ore. — In Newberg High’s industrial kitchen, students chop onions, jalapeños, tomatoes, and limes to make salsa while others shape cookies on sheet pans.

This isn’t a typical home economics class. These students are learning industrial culinary skills, preparing for careers in restaurant and hospitality management, and earning their food handler cards along the way.

Jane Eilert, the culinary management teacher at Newberg High, has been part of the program for 20 years. She recently expanded the curriculum with the new industrial kitchen facility built using 2020 bond funds.

“The food and nutrition class that goes into culinary management — these are careers directly related to hospitality, tourism, and management,” Eilert said. “It’s also the art of cooking.”

Eilert said she models some lessons after Oregon State University’s food science program to create a pathway for students to succeed in hospitality, restaurant management, or food marketing.

“It is definitely not a home economics class. It is very much a career technical education class, where all the skills we’re learning here you could take and use in any business,” Eilert said. “A lot of the kids who take these classes, I find them working in restaurants around town because they get their food handler card right out of the box.”

Students begin with food science and nutrition, learning knife skills and studying how acid and salt interact in cooking.

“We do sourdough from the very beginning,” Eilert said. “They do pickles, then we go into sugars, and then we talk about different things that affect cooking, like acid, salt, and heat.”

For the sugar lesson, students make cakes and charcuterie boards with caramel. Later in the term, Eilert plans to lead a unit on beef and vegetables.

Advanced students in the culinary management or catering classes work in the industrial kitchen, learning to operate bakeries and make concessions such as cookies, cinnamon rolls, and apple or beef pot pies to sell at school events, including theater performances.

They also study pricing and restaurant concepts. The program includes a bistro area where, next term, students will design breakfast, brunch, or lunch menus and develop dishes like waffles.

For the final term, Eilert plans a “meats and sweets” section, where students transform the bistro into a bakery or barbecue. They also choose who to invite as guests — past events have hosted members of the Rotary and Kiwanis clubs.

“I did want to be a chef, but I just like this class. Miss Eilert is my favorite teacher — I’ve taken all her classes,” said student Macee Amaya.

As a catering assistant to the food science class, Amaya helps scoop cookies in the industrial kitchen. Having completed the introductory course, she’s now doing an independent study making fresh pasta, ravioli, sweet rolls, and streusel.

Eilert said students bake thousands of cookies each year using a school business recipe that remains a secret.

“They know from the very beginning that over half the food they make will actually be sold to help pay for the food that they’re eating,” she said.

In the higher-level culinary management class, students also build résumés and portfolios of their dishes while applying for local, state, and national scholarships to support their next steps in food education.

Eilert said her culinary classes are typically filled to capacity with 300 to 350 students each year.

“The community can get involved if they’re interested in having an event space — we can host 30 to 40 people,” she said. “If they have a meeting and need a place to have it, we can set it up with a breakfast menu. It just has to be during school hours.”