Sullivan University’s National Center for Hospitality Studies (NCHS) honored Chef Colby Garrelts of bluestem Restaurant in Kansas City with the prestigious Distinguished Visiting Chef award on November 10. As recipient of the award, Garrelts presented on-campus cooking demonstrations, book signings and question-and-answer sessions held exclusively for Sullivan University students.

Designed to connect today’s aspiring culinarians with industry leaders, The Distinguished Visiting Chef Series has been recognizing three top chefs annually since its inception in 1988. Garrelts is the 41st recipient of the award, joining an impressive roster of chefs that includes Bob Kinkead, Emeril Lagasse, Louis Osteen, Rick Tramonto and Marcel Desaulniers.

Garrelts, who has been nominated several times for Best Chef Midwest by the James Beard Foundation and was named by Food & Wine magazine as one of the Top 10 Best New Chefs in 2005, obtained his culinary education in kitchens across the country. A native of Kansas City, Garrelts cooked at two prestigious private clubs, the famed American Restaurant, and the legendary Stolen Grill while attending culinary school. He developed a taste for big-city cuisine, small-business acumen and the aspiration to see what culinary experiences he could acquire in larger cities. With all of this on his mind, Garrelts moved to Chicago in 1999, where he became the senior sous chef at the five-star, five-diamond restaurant TRU under nationally acclaimed chefs Rick Tramanto and Gale Gand. At TRU, Garrelts honed his technical skills, developed his culinary style and met his future wife/partner Megan Schultz.

Of the three things you can manage—cost, quality and quantity—you can realistically only manage two. Or so thought the Institute for the Culinary Arts at Metropolitan Community College     .

By James E. Trebbien, CCE, CCA

Omaha, according to some of the people who study such things, has more restaurants per capita than any other U.S. city. In addition to this amazing number of restaurants, the menu is varied, diverse, excellent and reasonably priced. The quality of the restaurants is excellent. As in most major metropolitan areas, to be a chef or restaurant manager in Omaha takes a lot of education and knowledge because of the competition, choices, culinary talent and business sophistication.

From social networking’s impact on success to a greater emphasis on in-house rustic fare to save cost, Technomic predicts the biggest influences on U.S. restaurants next year.

Just as the nation's economic forecast includes mixed signals, restaurants across the United States face a varied landscape of expected trends in 2012. Technomic, the leading foodservice research and consulting firm, sees these seven developments making news in the coming year:

1. Consumers Seek a Twist on the Familiar. Shell-shocked consumers are in no mood to take risks, but novel flavors still tingle their taste buds. Look for comfort foods with a twist (gourmet, ethnic, artisan, wood-fired) as well as innovation in familiar formats (sandwiches, wraps, pizza, pasta) rather than breakout items taken from less-familiar global cuisines.

The CIA’s recent Worlds of Flavor® International Conference & Festival examined the casualization of fine dining.

Dozens of leading chefs from all over the world shared their expertise about the growing role of casual food in different world cuisines at The Culinary Institute of America (CIA) at Greystone in St. Helena, Calif., November 3-5. “World Casual: The Future of American Menus” was the topic of the 14^th-annual Worlds of Flavor® International Conference & Festival held at the college’s Napa Valley campus.

Jose Garces, the James Beard Award-winning Ecuadorian-American chef who owns eight restaurants in Philadelphia and Chicago, provided examples of how to successfully translate world-casual concepts onto American menus. The Food Network Iron Chef led a workshop on the signature casual flavors of Mexico, Ecuador and Peru and gave a presentation about the next generation of Latin casual at a session moderated by Chef Rick Bayless, with CIA chef-instructor Iliana de la Vega as a fellow presenter.

USS Philippine Sea shares culinary techniques with high-school students in Eastern Europe.

By Petty Officer 2nd Class Gary Prill

Culinary specialists from the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea met with culinary arts students of the Burgas High School in Burgas, Bulgaria, to provide techniques and training as part of a community service project, October 26.

During the event, the crew worked alongside the students making cultural dishes, desserts and appetizers that they later enjoyed at lunch. The event also gave the sailors a chance to meet with local residents and experience the rich history and culture of Bulgaria.

Says Mintel, Millennials lack skill, but believe learning to cook is one way to earn credibility with peers.

While Baby Boomers have been given credit for launching America’s cooking craze and nurturing it over the past few decades, Baby Boomers’ children, the Millennial generation (aged 17-34 in 2011), are now poised to take over and start stirring the pot.

According to a new Mintel report, younger cooks may lack skill in the kitchen, but make up for it with their enthusiasm. Only 6% of Millennials say they have advanced skill in the kitchen, compared to 15% of those aged 55+. A quarter (25%) of Millennials, however, claim to “love cooking” versus 17% of their senior counterparts.

“It appears that years of frequent cooking helps to hone skills, but the downside is they sometimes fall into a rut from fixing the same dishes over and over,” says Fiona O’Donnell, senior analyst at Mintel. “This creates an opportunity for marketers to provide seniors with options that adhere to specific health requirements, as well as add an element of fun and adventure to meal prep.”

Bill Rodgers, executive chef, Keens Steakhouse, New York City

By Lynn Schwartz

Keens Steakhouse in New York City is renowned for superb hand-picked and dry-aged steaks and the legendary mutton chop, a 26-ounce saddle of lamb, that TheNew York Times promises will “provide as much pleasure as a carnivore could want.” But on Thanksgiving, it’s the turkey, a special guest on the Keens’ menu, that takes center stage. For Executive Chef Bill Rodgers, Thanksgiving means serving up a bountiful feast, which includes preparing 50 (20-pound) turkeys and more than 3,000 side dishes. And like any guest star, the turkey must be excellent, worthy of both the holiday and the restaurant’s stellar reputation.

Although this part of case-study teaching can be arduous, there’s real value in reading papers. Doing so allows us to suggest ways to improve students’ thinking.

By Dr. Fred Mayo, CHE, CHT

Last month, we discussed Types of Case Studies, as part of the continuing series on case studies. This month’s Mayo Clinic is about evaluating student papers, an aspect of case-study teaching, but also one of the challenges of teaching that many of us dread or at least would like to avoid. In large universities with big classes, teaching assistants often help with, or complete, this task, but in most culinary programs, it is part of our teaching responsibilities. There are advantages and teachable moments involved.

Contrary to what students might think, life is not like “Hell’s Kitchen,” where food can be discarded with abandon. Here are eight easy and effective ways to teach basic food-cost principles that will serve your students well.

By Adam Weiner, CFSE

I believe that for our students to climb the kitchen ladder of success, it is important to teach them not only also how to cook well, but how to think like a chef. One thing that has always been at the forefront of chefs’ minds throughout the centuries is food costs. In today’s world, food costs, more than ever, can make or break a commercial establishment. (Even if you are only teaching a class to teach people how to cook at home, food costs are still critically important, since food is a very large part of a household budget.)

The truth about GMOs.

By Christopher Koetke, CEC, CCE

In this world, we live surrounded by myths and even believe some of them. Lobsters scream when you boil them. Eating bananas makes you more appealing to mosquitoes. And a company has genetically engineered and marketed a tomato containing a gene from the arctic flounder to make the tomato more resistant to frost and cold. Like most myths, this one has a kernel of truth, but turns out it’s more of a red herring than a fishy tomato. Yes, back in 1991, DNA Plant Technologies did experiment with this, but it was a total failure, was never marketed, and the idea died in the laboratory. So please feel free to continue eating tomatoes.

As educators, we often stay away from controversial issues like genetically modified organisms (GMOs), either because we don’t feel secure in our own knowledge of them or because we see them as too political and polarizing. And in the culinary world, as we look to many respected chefs who are dedicated to organic and sustainable foods, GMOs elicit a “Hell, no, we won’t go there” response. But is that response built on fact or fiction? Where did they get their information? Was it factual and provided by a neutral source?