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When Students Shape the Menu

A few weeks ago, I watched our students heatedly debate how hot a hot sauce should be. They weren’t arguing about whether they could make one—that seemed to be a given—but rather, how far they wanted to push the flavor. They added a squeeze of lime, a few spices, and suddenly the conversation shifted. They were no longer following a recipe: they were making the dish their own.

Every year, our Teen Culinary Apprentices take on a unique challenge: conceiving, developing, and presenting three canapés for hundreds of guests at our Art of Cooking gala. The student tasting stations are a real-world stage for the teens to step into professional roles. Not as assistants, but as creative leads. Because the canapé menu isn’t handed to them—it evolves from their own ideas.

Over the past few weeks, our class time at Hillcrest High School in Queens has been dedicated to the process of tasting and refining the bites they’ll serve on the night. Realizing their dishes would be served to hundreds of guests at a fundraising gala in Manhattan sparked a new level of energy in the room. One of my students, Tawdrea, pitched Buffalo Cauliflower bites to the class, and they all immediately agreed. They knew they wanted to make something seasonal (even in winter), so we built a dish around citrus. They wanted to make a fruity chutney, so we started exploring Indian street food.

They started showing up to class early, being more expressive about every bite, and focusing on their knife work. They’re even a little competitive now that they feel real ownership over the menu. They want to impress! Just a week after I taught them how, Tanisha and Shakiba cut perfect citrus supremes without any guidance. I trained in kitchens like Chez Panisse, and I’ve seen plenty of professional cooks struggle with that level of precision. They’re taking it seriously, because we’re taking them seriously.

Growth like that doesn’t come out of nowhere. Over 20 weeks, the Apprentices build knife skills, learn to balance flavor, and develop the confidence to trust their own instincts in the real world. Some come with experience—one student even runs a baking business—while others are brand new to cooking. By the time we reach gala preparation, however, they’re collaborating, problem-solving, and organizing like they’ve been doing this for years.

When guests stop by the student stations, they’ll see Buffalo cauliflower tossed in a Calabrian chili hot sauce, crispy pani puri layered with cherry chutney and fresh herbs, and bright endive cups with winter citrus and toasted sourdough. What they might not see are the hours these students have poured into getting every detail right: tasting sauces one tablespoon at a time, debating textures, and reworking plating until it felt just right. As an educator, my goal is to step back and let them run the kitchen by the end of the apprenticeship—and during this process, I’ve watched them do exactly that. They’re not just cooking recipes; they’re thinking like chefs, using what we call their “chef brain” to balance flavor and improvise when something doesn’t go as planned. Over time, I’ve watched these students go from asking for constant reassurance to trusting their own instincts.

That’s what makes this gala experience so special. These students aren’t simply helping in the kitchen or serving guests; they’re presenting ideas they’ve shaped together. The Teen Culinary Apprenticeship program prepares them for a lifetime of cooking: when groceries are expensive and food access isn’t always consistent, knowing how to improvise in the kitchen isn’t just a skill, it’s a form of independence. Whether they use these skills to feed themselves and their families or step into careers in the culinary world, for one special night at the gala they get to share their hard work with a room full of people who believe in their potential.

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