Cooking Up a Storm in the Classroom : Culinary students at Oxnard College go out of the frying pan and into the fire preparing six meals each week.

Flames, two feet high, leap from the searing chicken teriyaki, steam pans keep noodles at the ready-to-serve temperature, plates sit in the warming oven and a stock pot the size of Rhode Island simmers with egg flower soup.

“Two more vegetarians!” shouts the waiter. A smiling chef sprinkles some soy sauce, a little garlic powder and a little more Oriental seasoning over the vegetables.

Dinner at a local Asian restaurant? No, the Wednesday luncheon at Oxnard College--prepared by students in the hotel and restaurant management program--features a Far Eastern menu this week.

Preparations begin at 8 a.m. Ricardo slices red pepper and crushes peanuts. Val chops onions, cabbage and carrots. Gary cuts chicken and beef into bite-size pieces. Coral sautes bananas in butter and brown sugar, and Al goes from station to station--tasting, advising and making sure everything proceeds on schedule.

Pans, all shapes, all sizes--some 30 inches across--sit at the ready. Twenty-four-inch-long whisks, eight tongs, 12 ladles and mixing blades as wide as Aunt Freda hang from ceiling-suspended hooks. The walk-in fridge houses 60 dozen eggs, 20 gallons of pasta sauce, lettuce for about a hundred and enough cheese to keep an entire Wisconsin town in business.

There’s a steamer that will do vegetables for 100 people in three minutes, a “buffalo chopper” that will chop 25 pounds of onions in 90 seconds, five pizza ovens, two convection ovens, a grill to die for and a 15-gallon stove inset for sauce preparation.

This is no wimpy “home ec” kitchen. These people mean business.

By 11 a.m., it’s all coming together. Lisa has collected leaves, berries and other foliage from the college grounds and made centerpieces for each table. Marco, today’s headwaiter, has donned his green cutaway jacket and half-glasses; Thomas, Joan and Nancy are in cummerbund and tie, ready to serve.

Ricardo Tejeda, Valerie Ordone, Gary Billingsley, Coral Elandt, Lisa Beamer, Marco Batun, Thomas Balades, Joan Yates and Nancy Schumacher are all students in the hotel and restaurant management program at Oxnard College. Al Alviar is their mentor, one member of the culinary arts faculty at the school.

Students in the Oxnard program prepare and serve six full meals every week. Three are lunches for the college cafeteria, two are cafeteria dinners and one is a weekly luncheon that is open to the public. The latter is the best meal deal in town. For under $5, diners get food prepared to meet with the instructor’s approval, with rotating weekly choices of American, Southwest, Middle Eastern and Far Eastern menus. (In January, the ambience will be that of an Italian bistro.)

Students in hotel and restaurant management come in every age, ethnicity and career background imaginable. But they share one abiding characteristic: They do now, and always have, loved cooking. And they are in this program to become chefs, sous-chefs, bakers, caterers or restaurant owners.

The program began as a part-time endeavor at Moorpark College some years ago but transferred to Oxnard College and full-time status in 1985.

The new program was put in the hands of Frank Haywood, who had been teaching in a similar program at Santa Barbara City College. Haywood brought Alviar with him from Santa Barbara and together they have seen the student body grow to its current turn-away capacity of more than 80.

Notable among the program’s accomplishments is the way the culinary students’ efforts have been meshed with the needs of the college cafeteria.

In 1987, culinary students took on more than 90% of the food preparation for the cafeteria, which had been running in the red for some years. It took three years, but by 1990, the cafeteria budget went from red to black due to an expanded menu and reduced labor costs.

As part of their classwork, the students plan, prepare and serve much of the cafeteria menu--simultaneously getting exposure to the planning, purchasing and pricing of food.

“We don’t just teach them how to cook and bake,” Haywood said. “They learn how to manage food, how to make money from food.”

“The management-by-menu class teaches us how to find out what’s selling, how a particular menu item is doing,” said Beamer, a second-semester student in the program.

Beamer, a former secretary and receptionist who was laid off just before Christmas last year, says she is thrilled with her experience in the program.

“There’s a lot of teamwork and camaraderie with the other students,” she said. “We’re all ages, all colors, all sizes, but we really work together.”

Students in the program have a variety of alternatives from which to choose. The options begin with certification from the Ventura County Community College District in culinary-food service, restaurant management and hotel management.

In addition, through cooperative ventures, a culinary certification is available from the American Culinary Federation Educational Institute, and management diplomas are offered from the Educational Foundation of the National Restaurant Assn. and from the American Hotel and Motel Assn. These are obtained after completion of additional courses recommended and approved by the professional organizations.

Students may also opt for an associate of science degree, which means they must complete the general education courses required of all degree-seeking students. The associate degree is needed if a student plans to transfer to another institution for a baccalaureate. Oxnard College articulates with Cal Poly Pomona’s hospitality program, which accepts all hotel and restaurant management units for transfer.

Deciding which route to take can prove difficult, however. When she entered the program, Beamer knew she would love the cooking aspects and was equally sure she would dislike the baking. “I’ve always hated baking, but since I started this (baking) class, I’ve completely changed my feelings about it. I’m now baking bread at home and making brownies from scratch,” she said with a laugh.

Fellow student Balades does not share her enthusiasm for baking. “I can’t make an eclair worth a darn,” he said. “I’ve definitely crossed pastry chef off my list.”

Not to worry, however. Balades, in his fifth semester of the program, was recently accepted to Rhode Island’s prestigious Johnson and Whales, the only school in the country that offers a bachelor’s degree in culinary arts.

While Balades found his niche early in life, coming to the Oxnard College program directly from high school, many of the students are career-change transplants.

Yates is one such student. At 55, with a master’s degree in speech pathology and audiology, Yates decided she needed some change in her life. “I was coming home so burned out,” she said.

Now in her third semester, Yates holds down three jobs while she attends the food program. To help her meet the tuition requirements (Yates pays $50 a unit instead of the usual $13 because she already has a bachelor’s degree), she applied for and received scholarships from the American Express Restaurant Writers’ Assn. and from the HRM Club, an organization of students in the program who hold fund-raisers to provide financial assistance to other students. (This month, the club is selling personalized gingerbread men to add money to the scholarship coffers. For order information, see the Details box.)

“This program has answered everything I wanted,” Yates said. “I love the hands-on aspect.”

Students spend 12 to 18 hours per week in the lab--the kitchen--and about five hours a week in the classroom. It is during the lab time that students prepare lunch and dinner or cater for clubs and organizations in the community.

Another favorite activity for students is running the Make-Your-Own Strawberry Shortcake booth at the Strawberry Festival each May. This year, they used 10,000 pounds of strawberries to serve 11,000 shortcakes over the two-day festival.

Students also have the opportunity to serve as proxy contestants in the Berry-Off competition. The Berry-Off, an international recipe contest, holds its finals at Oxnard College each April. Contestants who are not able to make the trip to Oxnard may have a student stand in to prepare the recipe.

Former hotel and restaurant management students are scattered throughout the country. Some have gone on to Cal Poly, others to Oxnard’s Mandalay Beach Resort, the Wedgewood Banquet Facility and the Hilton Financial Plaza. Billingsley will soon leave for San Francisco’s California Culinary Academy. Recent husband-and-wife graduates have opened their own cafe and bakery in Idaho.

By 1:30 p.m., the Wednesday lunch rush has ended, all the patrons have gone. The “restaurant staff,” looking only a little worse for the wear, finally sits down to enjoy the fruits of its labor. They look tired, content and more than a little proud.

Cookies for the Masses

Having the family over for the holidays? How about the family and all their friends? The following recipe for cinnamon pecan cookies from Oxnard College’s hotel and restaurant management program may be just the thing. The recipe makes 27 pounds of cookies. You can divide ingredients for a lesser crowd.

CINNAMON PECAN COOKIES

Granulated sugar:

7 lbs., 4 oz.

Butter: 2 lbs., 4 oz.

Shortening: 1 lb., 13 oz.

Salt: 1 oz.

Cinnamon: 4 oz.

Cream all the ingredients for two minutes on third speed. Whole eggs (out of shells): 2 lbs., 4 oz.

Molasses: 12 oz.

Water: 8 oz.

Add above ingredients to first mixture; mix, scrape bowl, mix one minute on second speed. Cake flour: 8 lbs., 4 oz.

Pecan pieces: 4 lbs.

Vanilla: 1 oz.

Add to above mixture, mix to incorporate, scrape bowl, mix two minutes on second speed.

BAKING: Drop by hand or cookie scoop in 1 1/2-inch balls. Bake at 350 degrees (or 325 degrees for convection oven), for 10-12 minutes.

FYI

For information about the restaurant and hotel management program at Oxnard College, call 985-5869.

* LUNCH: For Wednesday luncheon reservations, call 986-5824. Luncheons are served from 11:30 a.m. until 1 p.m. through December. In January, luncheons will be on Thursdays from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Prices are in the $4 to $6 range.

* ORDERS: To order personalized gingerbread men from the HRM Club, call 986-5869 and leave a message. Gingerbread men will be 10 inches tall, and must be ordered by Friday. Delivery is available in a limited area, or orders may be picked up at the college. Orders should be ready on Tuesday.