It was a scene more common to a fancy Sunday brunch than a high school cafeteria.

A professional chef, decked out in kitchen whites, was preparing made-to-order grilled chicken Caesar salads at a table laden with garden-fresh ingredients.

The line of students waiting for their chance to taste one of the special salads (at a cost of $3.75 each) revealed that this scene was indeed taking place in the cafeteria of Park High School.

It was there, a few Thursdays ago, that chef Ralph Garcia, came to share his culinary skills with the 700 to 800 students who eat lunch in Park's cafeteria each day.

Garcia is a regional executive chef for Chartwells, the international food service company which provides school-time meals for all Racine Unified School District locations. His two-day visit to Park High included the Menutainment cooking demonstrations described above, as well as classroom presentations about career options in the culinary field.

The Menutainment program is part of an effort by Chartwells to "keep things fresh" in the school lunch program here, said Dan Blimling, resident district manager for Chartwells. Such programs are important when serving today's high school students - a clientele that Blimling said has more sophisticated tastes than it had years ago.

"You used to be able to serve something called Chicken Supreme and they'd eat it," he said. "But kids today eat out more and are more likely to be exposed to different kinds of foods."

The Menutainment program not only offers fresh lunch options for sale, but presents nutritional information in an entertaining way, as well as giving kids more personal attention with their meal options, Blimling explained.

Chartwells' goal is to eventually have local food service representatives at area high school locations be able to carry out such Menutainment demonstrations, he said.

"The expertise (Garcia) brings in helps raise the bar and everyone benefits," Blimling said.

Learning opportunities

Garcia also brought his expertise into the classroom at Park, where he shared the story of his career path with students in both a foods class and an English as a Second Language Class. A Texas native, Garcia, described how he worked his way up from washing pots and pans in a "little bitty restaurant in small town Texas" to his position of executive chef, having cooked for dignitaries from around the world, including first lady Barbara Bush.

He explained how, as an athletic 16-year-old, he had to drop out of sports to help support his parents, who both became ill while he was still in high school.

He said he didn't know it at the time, but the job he took washing dishes then was the beginning of a successful career in culinary arts.

One day the chef at that restaurant, who was from Spain, asked Garcia if he'd like to learn how to cook.

"He showed me how to open the grill, and from that day on I took the ball and ran with it," Garcia said. "I learned so much from him. He took me under his wing and showed me the ropes and I wanted to show him I could make it happen as a real cook."

That he did. After graduating from high school, Garcia pursued his passion at the culinary school at the University of Houston, as well as spending about a year learning at the Culinary Institute of American in Hyde Park, New York. Along the way he also worked in restaurants, learning whatever he could from the more experienced chefs.

Sure, the hours can be long (a lot of nights and weekends) and the work hard in the culinary industry, but each experience you have is valuable and the rewards in the end are worth it, Garcia said.

"I've seen and done a lot of interesting things, and met all kinds of people."

Working for a large corporation like Chartwells allows for a wide variety of cooking, learning and traveling opportunities, he said.

In addition to providing food service to schools and universities nationwide, Chartwells has also done the food for big sports venues including Wrigley Field, Lambeau Field and the Texas Motor Speedway, Garcia said.

"We also did all the food for the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City."

And, if you know what you are doing as a chef, you can make "big bucks," Garcia told the students at Park.

Career planning

Having come up through his field as one of just a few Hispanic executive chefs, Garcia said he has seen an increase in diversity among chefs in recent years, both in race and gender.

"There are many more women chefs today than there were when I started out," he said.

He encouraged students in Larry Kempen's Culinary Arts class, to consider a career in the culinary field, and gave them a look into the variety of opportunities available in that line of work today, from professional ice sculpting to working as a chef on cruise ships.

Garciaoffered advice to students looking to pursue a career culinary arts could be applied to just about any career path.

Set goals, he said, and realize that they won't be reached overnight.

"It takes time to achieve such things."

Get a good education.

"Without that, nothing is going to work," Garcia said. "And remember that its not just about cooking. Working in the food industry, you need to have math, reading and science skills and be able to deal with things ranging from payroll to taking inventory. There is a lot more involved than you might think - it is not just flipping omelettes."

Continue to learn.

"To be successful in life, you should never stop learning," he said. "There will be a lot of struggles along the way - it's not going to be a piece of cake. But don't give up. You have to keep trying in order to make it."