Two KDS DAR High School students in the Family & Consumer Science (FACS) program have done what no other Alabama team has been able to do in six years – place in the Southeastern Regional Junior Chef competition. The students, juniors Leecia Jackson and Addie Walker, first won the Alabama state competition, qualifying them to go to Kentucky to compete in the Southeast Regional Junior Chefs where they earned third place with their recipe for veggie quesadillas.
The Junior Chef program, which began in 2017, involves high school teams of one to four students whose school participates in the National School Nutrition Program. The competition calls for the team to create a potential school lunch that their cafeteria could serve to students. The criteria also calls for the meal to meet USDA nutritional values while using at least two locally resourced ingredients and two commodity items.
To qualify for the Southeast Regional contest, the girls participated and placed first at the state competition in Birmingham. Leecia, who hopes to become a Family and Consumer Science teacher herself, plans to use the 2-year culinary program scholarship to Jefferson State Community College the girls were awarded when they won the state contest in Birmingham. The Southeast Regionals were then held in Kentucky where the girls’ 3rd place earned them both $5,000 scholarships to Kentucky’s Sullivan University.
Leecia and Addie will present their recipe to a group of CNP supervisors at a gathering in June, and their recipe will go out to school systems all over the state. Mrs. Clark said, “The recipe really is simple enough for a school lunchroom staff to be able to utilize and it’s tasty enough that students should enjoy it.”
The experience of creating a winning dish has inspired the girls and Mrs. Clark, and they are already thinking about what they might do for next year’s competition as an encore.
Congratulations, Leecia and Addie!
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