Culinary Arts 1 is finishing up the semester with an unusual final. The students had the opportunity to compete in a food truck design competition.

“They had to develop a business plan for a food truck, including designing the outside and what equipment they would need on the inside of the truck,” Culinary Arts teacher Heide Rippert said.

Not only did the students have to design the truck, they also had to come up with two main dish and two side dish food items. Rippert wanted the students to adapt recipes and make them original.

Junior Allison Doud made her own seafood stock for her shrimp etouffee to make it original. But the effort put in can be rewarding.

The students will get their food judged by five different faculty members in the school, including Rippert. Since there is a limited amount of space in the kitchen, the class split up into two groups. Part of the class was judged last Thursday.  And the other half will be looked at on this Thursday.

This gives the students a chance to help one another while cooking. In the days between judging, the students can work on their rationale project for why Manhattan should have food trucks.

“They have to write a short rationale paper and research… the history on it and [explain] why they should provide food trucks in Manhattan,” said Rippert.

This is not the only competition some of the students will be involved in. Rippert hopes the group will be able to go to competitions in February, March and April. By designing the menu for their semester final, it should prepare the group for upcoming competitions.

“So this kind of gets their blood pumping. Because in those competitions, two of them they have to develop a menu for,” Rippert said.