WORDEN — Students at Huntley Project Schools are pampered daily with home cooked meals for lunch, and once a month a guest chef comes in to make the occasion even more special.
On Thursday, 700 students enjoyed a hot and hearty meal thanks to this month’s guest chef Jeremy Evans, a freelance chef from Billings.
Evans decided to make a shrimp boil complete with shrimp, corn, potatoes, and sausage.
“I made a nice Cajun butter to go with the shrimp and it’ll be something they’re probably not used to. Growing up as a picky eater myself, I just wanted to push that idea of trying new things for kids,” said Evans.
“It’s always good and they try different stuff,” said second-grader Wyatt Manning.
The uniqueness of the meal is one of the reasons that Evans decided to cook it whenever Huntly Project Schools asked him to be a guest chef.
“Just homecooked, everything’s warm, not frozen, it's real good,” said Kooper Beard, an eighth-grader at Huntley Project Schools.
The students are aware and appreciate that they have higher quality meals.
“I think it’s good to have a good variety. That way it’s not the same thing every day. A lot of the food is good like actual food, not just like sandwiches every day or something,” said senior Tobias Lettas.
Huntley Project schools tries to keep the food fresh and locally sourced. This includes a daily salad bar of fresh greens.
“I can’t see any kid not having the opportunity for a good meal, but there's kids out there that don’t. That’s my motivation. We try to feed them very high-quality, locally sourced food. Something that you would go to a restaurant and order, we’re cooking it here,” said Ginger Buchanan, the food service manager at Huntley Project Schools.
The program started just a few years ago, but Buchanan hopes to keep it going.
Related: Huntley Project Schools boosting meal service thanks to $130K grant
