Students vie to be ace of cakes

Years of coloring in the lines paid off when Kerry Stack's first-year culinary arts students decorated cakes at Douglas High School.

The class had a two-week unit in cake decorating where they practiced different frosting techniques on parchment paper and used what they learned on real 6-inch cakes Thursday and Friday.

Matt Bates, 17, described the technique he used on the cake decorated with a hamburger design.

"I just grabbed the icing and squirted it," said Bates. "I want the teacher to grade it so I can eat it."

Patrick Griffin is taking culinary arts as an elective in his junior year and will return next year.

"This is the first time I ever decorated a cake," said Griffin, 17, as he put the finishing touches on his "Summer Time" cake with a palm tree, sunshine and sea.

"The Carson Valley Inn donated cakes and most of the frosting and their time to the class," said Stack. "(Director of Food and Beverage) David Goodwin at the CVI volunteers his services. He is our partner and chef mentor the culinary program."

Two Carson Valley Inn pastry chefs were in the Douglas culinary arts room assisting culinary students all day Thursday and Friday.

Tracy Miller said she started at CVI's bakery 11 years ago and worked her way up to pastry chef.

"I learned everything there," Miller said. "Before I worked there, I never decorated a cake before. We didn't have anything like this in school. It's a lot of hard work to learn this and we appreciate someone coming in with experience."

Assistant pastry chef Sheryl Luxon is former owner of Creative Cakes of Carson City.

"I'm really impressed with the students," Luxon said. "They just need to do it a little more and they're hirable."