Boulder Valley middle school students turned to adventurous recipes like curry, paella and dahl as they battled to get their dishes on the school district’s lunch menu.
The challenge for Wednesday’s annual “Iron Chef” competition at the school district’s Culinary Center was to create a tasty, healthy dish with an “Around the World” theme.
Boulder Valley uses the annual cooking challenge to generate lunch ideas from students and share the district’s healthy school food philosophy. Wednesday’s competition also included samples of future menu items, including a chocolate pudding made with avocado and a vegan pesto pasta, that the district is developing to increase dairy free and gluten free options.
Students districtwide will have the option to eat the winning dish, red lentil dahl with curried broccoli, at lunch during the next school year.
“We wanted to push ourselves and have fun,” said Centennial Middle sixth grader Luna Futral, who cooked the dahl with classmate Jayne Williams. “Dahl is something my family makes. It’s vegetarian. It’s budget friendly. It’s really easy to make, and it’s something everyone can enjoy.”
For the challenge, teams must create a dish that’s delicious, kid friendly, meets USDA nutritional guidelines, doesn’t cost more than $2 a plate and is easy to replicate and cook in large quantities. Entrees were judged by Boulder Valley food service managers and three guest judges.
Guest judge Garren Teich, a former Denver restaurant chef who now works as a production manager for a liquid nitrogen ice cream business, said he worries high grocery prices and stressed families mean the current generation of kids isn’t as likely to learn to cook — making Boulder Valley’s focus on healthy, kid-friendly recipes “really important.”
“Give them a 10- to 12-year start on eating healthy, it becomes a habit,” he said.
Wednesday’s cook-off featured six student teams chosen from more than 40 entries. Along with scoring a place on next year’s school lunch menu, winners received cash prizes for their schools.
“These are some of the best recipes we’ve ever had,” said Boulder Valley Food Services Director Carolyn Villa. “It’s really exciting.”
A three-student team from Southern Hills Middle School — Julien Rosenstein, Evan O’Connor and Aadi Khetarpaul — took second with their pollo paella recipe. They modified the recipe by switching the traditional pork chorizo for a chicken version, saying they wanted to be sensitive to cultural restrictions on pork. They also ditched cost-prohibitive saffron for less expensive turmeric.
“This was a good opportunity to learn how to make paella and just have fun with it,” Evan said. “It would expose people to new kinds of cuisine.”
Eldorado K-8 seventh graders Hadley Flood and Jordyn Bultz said they wanted to share their love of Mediterranean food by adding a chicken orzo dish with tomatoes and spinach to the lunch menu.
Jordyn described the dish as colorful and unique, adding it’s easy to make in bulk and inexpensive.
“We love cooking, and we want to share what we love with other people,” she said.
Horizons K-8 seventh grader Anora Brown said her team added water chestnuts, peas and cauliflower to their favorite chicken curry recipe to meet the competition’s vegetable requirement. Anora, who was joined by teammates Francesca Rogers and Cohen Rose, said she tested the dish the day before the competition.
“I usually don’t like cauliflower at all, but I absolutely loved this dish,” she said.
Chloe Bujosa and Jocelyn Wayer, eighth graders at Aspen Creek K-8, have entered the competition all three years of middle school. This year, they went with Mexican chicken street tacos, putting their own spin on a marinade recipe they found online with spices that included oregano, chili powder, cumin and smoked paprika.
“We both love to cook,” Jocelyn said. “We love to be creative, and cooking helps us express that.”
