Ten 'Hut

Army National Guard culinary training is high and tight

Here’s a confession: Military life isn’t always accurately portrayed in the media. For a case in point, I’m told that some soldiers still get assigned to KP as punishment, peeling giant piles of potatoes or mopping floors as “character building,” but meals for the service these days are prepared by enlisted men and women with culinary skills.

Members of the Army National Guard stationed here are taking it to the next level, however, by spending a week in the kitchen classroom at Santa Fe Culinary Academy.

Last month, a group of cooks wrapped up their training session by serving a meal to some higher-ups in the command structure.

"Are we going to see more meals like this one?" asks the ranking officer.

"Yes, sir," replies the supply clerk.

The troops in this small class were the third group to visit the downtown culinary school from the National Guard's Oñate Complex near the Santa Fe Municipal Airport, where cooks feed up to 300 Army and Air Force enlistees a day who are visiting for their own specialized training.

Army culinary specialists have the rank of 92G, which means they've been through a course about preparing food in standard proportions for, well, an army. But the classes in Santa Fe gave them more ideas about technique as well as offering a certification called ServSafe about food handling to prevent disease and contamination.

The extra training helped Specialist Yolanda Duran get a better handle on her knife, literally. After Chef Rocky Durham shows her how to position her grip further toward the top of the chef's knife, she immediately feels the difference.

"I kind of learned to hold it this way," she says, demonstrating over a pile of fresh herbs, "so that you have more control of what you are cutting. "

The class also gave her a chance to improve what professionals call "fabricating," or what you might call cutting up a whole chicken into usable pieces.

"We did that once in the Army training," says Duran. "Now, we've done it a lot of times."

The meal at the class' completion includes chicken cacciatore, bowtie pasta salad, fresh bread and a from-scratch carrot cake. While the troops prepare the meal, Durham even fries up the wings to demonstrate a simple dressing of hot sauce and butter.

Durham says of all the courses he teaches, the military students are among the best because of their work ethic.

"There is no whining," he tells a collection of majors and colonels and sergeants as they nosh.

Duran, 30, says she swore she would never be a cook in the military, but now her full-time job in supply and the kitchen has her hooked. When she's tasked to use icing to create orange carrot on top of the cake for each portion, she hunches over with visible determination, the sleeves on her pale green T-shirt rolled up and a colorful tattoo peeking out from her bicep.

"I love cooking," she says. "The only thing I don't love is the hours. A lot of people think being a cook is such an easy job, but it's hard. It's a lot of hours on your feet. They don't always appreciate you. They don't always see what goes on behind the meal and what you are doing to make sure you are not getting people sick. And you want to make it good."

When it's time to serve lunch, the troops slip off their white aprons and button up their uniform coats to prepare for the arrival of the officers.

Although the details are somewhat uncertain, officials hopes to send more cooks to additional culinary classes, including expansion of the program to those who feed troops at the more than 30 armories in New Mexico, according to Col. Scott Weaver, who works in the operations division that manages the kitchens.

"We like to know that our cooks are getting the best practices to take into kitchens all over the state," he says, noting that National Guard troops will also take the skills home to jobs with civilian employers.

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