High school grads looking for careers should consider culinary arts, columnist says

Thousands of B.C. students are getting ready to graduate from high school, and many are still thinking about their future careers.

On The Coast food columnist Gail Johnson says if graduates are looking for a skilled trade with plenty of opportunity, they should consider culinary arts.

"Not everyone realizes that the culinary arts fall under the umbrella of skilled trades," Johnson told On The Coast guest host Michelle Elliot. "In B.C., chefs and cooks are expected to have the single, largest deficit of skilled trade workers by 2020. There will be an expected shortage of as many as 400 workers being required to fill the un-met demand."

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Because culinary arts isn't often thought of as an option, Johnson says, local chef David Robertson is helping students from low-income families get exposed to cooking as a career.

Robertson runs the Dirty Apron Cooking School and Delicatessen on Beatty Street, and for the last three years he has run field trips with students in Grades 5 and 6 to diverse locations where culinary skills are in demand.

Those field trips include trips to Rogers Arena, the Shangri-La Hotel and even Gate Gourmet where as many as 15,000 airline meals are prepared every day.

Johnson says Robertson was a troublemaker in school and never considered culinary arts as a career growing up.

"He was even kicked out of home ec [economics] class for sabotaging the muffin mixes with baking powder — all the muffins exploded while cooking. His teacher told him to never consider a career in cooking," Johnson said.

"[But] his dad was a butcher and his mom loved to cook, so he grew up around food, and that exposure steered him toward a career in cooking. But not everyone has that kind of influence."

Johnson says Robertson hopes to gives some students from low-income families the influence he got at home, and students often leave his program with new ideas about their future possibilities.

With files from CBC Radio One's On The Coast