Posted by Woodland Progress, PA on June 26, 2008 at 10:55:50:
Chef, 18, in national contest
By Stephanie Hacke, Staff Writer
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Over the last decade, Anthony Taglieri, 18, has spent countless hours preparing to be a chef.
From learning his grandma's recipes and secrets and working at fast-food outlets and some of the top restaurants in the eastern suburbs to attending Forbes Road Career & Technology Center's culinary arts program, Anthony has learned a great deal.
This week, all that training is being put to the test, as the Wilkins resident represents Pennsylvania in the Skills USA Culinary Arts competition in Kansas City, Mo.
For Anthony, this is just the latest exciting part of a lifelong journey to become a chef.
Some of Anthony's fondest childhood memories are in the kitchen.
At age 5, he had his first encounter with cooking, helping his grandmother make fried Italian doughnuts, for which fresh dough is dipped into hot oil, then cinnamon and sugar.
"Of course, I wasn't allowed to help with the oil part," he joked.
After he purchased his hunting license as a teenager, he said, he was able to learn a lot about butchering, which would later come in handy.
"You learn why certain parts of the meat are more tender than others."
As he continued to grow, he saw more opportunities to learn.
When his neighbor, Gary Klinefelter, executive chef at Shannopin Country Club, moved in, Anthony saw a chance to learn from a professional.
"He brought a lot of things with him that I'd never seen before.
"There was a big difference between watching a chef and my grandma," Anthony said.
To boost his knowledge, he read books by Anthony Bourdain and watched the Travel Channel.
Anthony said he used to watch the Food Network, but it has changed from the "chef's channel to the home cooks channel," so most professional chefs avoid watching it.
His first job in the food industry was in fast food, but he wasn't impressed.
"I thought, 'I love food, but this isn't food.'"
He spent some time at other jobs before moving to D'Imperio's in Wilkins, where he had his first job as a gourmet chef, working on salads.
When he had to have surgery on his foot, he had to leave his job for several months.
When he recovered, his position wasn't open, so he applied to become a chef at La Cucina Dolce in Monroeville, where Anthony has worked for the last nine months as a salad and appetizer chef.
As a junior at Woodland Hills High School, Anthony knew what he wanted to do with his life and that his best opportunity for training as a chef would be in Forbes Road's culinary arts department.
The best part of that training was that instructors were "giving us the skills to be able to do it ourselves in the future," Anthony said.
His said his classes started with safety training, including basics such as "pointing your knife down and keeping your blade toward yourself.
"They told us, 'Don't hit each other with knives.'"
The next steps at Forbes Road were learning about operating kitchen machinery, making salads and learning knife techniques.
"With lettuce, if you're going to use it that day, you can cut it," Anthony said.
"If it's going to be more than a day or two before you use it, you should tear it. Those are the types of things we learned."
Other helpful tips included one for iceberg lettuce.
"What you want to do is smash the root against something hard and all of the leaves will fall off.
"But don't try this on cabbage. It doesn't work."
Anthony has passed the Serv Safe certification program, which will give him two college credits in science.
He also had one of the highest National Occupational Competency Testing Institute scores, a PSSA equivalent, among students at Forbes Road, he said.
Despite these accomplishments, Anthony was three credits short of graduating from Woodland Hills with the Class of 2008.
Still, he plans to participate in the apprentice program at Nemacolin Woodlands Resort in partnership with Westmoreland Community College, starting later this month.
Anthony will earn an associate degree in culinary arts and be employed full-time.
All his work and training paid off for Anthony when he was best in his class at Forbes Road and was chosen to represent the school in Skills USA, a national competition for students in technical fields.
Competing at the district level in January, Anthony said, there was only one competitor he was worried about.
"I actually thought she beat me."
Finding out he won at the district level was a surprise, he said.
And the district-level victory meant Anthony would compete at the state level against 11 other students in April.
For the state competition, he was asked to prepare mustard crusted chicken with rice pilaf, broccoli with Hollandaise sauce, a salad with dressing and apple bread pudding.
Anthony was worried because he didn't have time to make a dressing for the salad.
Once again, Anthony said, he saw one competitor he was afraid he couldn't beat.
"When they said he was in second place, I thought, 'Who beat him?'
"When I found out I won, I couldn't stop smiling. It was a high I've never experienced before."
Being the top high school chef in the state wasn't that special for Anthony until he started counting the number of students he beat.
"It didn't seem like a big deal until I realized I heard it was out of 4,000 people."
Competing on the national level doesn't scare him, either.
Anthony has spent time preparing for the competition with the executive chef at Nemacolin Woodlands.
His biggest fear about the national contest: bringing his knives on the plane.
"I just hope they don't confiscate them. I'll need them out there and they're pretty expensive."
Anthony said what draws him to food is its ability to change someone's mood just by its taste.
"There's so much you can do with it. People need it and you can bring someone's feelings up with it."
Anthony's mother, Lisa, said she's proud of her son's accomplishments.
"Regardless of the obstacles he's faced in his life, he's accomplished a lot.
"His future's very bright and I look forward to visiting him at Nemacolin."
Lisa doesn't want to take credit for Anthony's culinary skills, though.
"He probably gets his talents from his 'Nonna.'"