Senior year involves many traditions: dances, ceremonies, senior week, senior giving and so much more. This year, a new tradition continues to evolve: the senior dinner series with President Bergeron. The dinners began last year through the work of Nick Gollner ’14, who hosted smaller scale dinners with members of the class and President Bergeron. This year, three seniors have been working to establish the dinners as another beloved senior tradition. Adam Chilton ’15, Ellie Storck ’15 and Conor Quilty ’15 have quickly donned chefs’ hats and accepted the challenge.
“Nick reached out to Connor at the end of last year knowing that Conor loved cooking,” Storck explained. With Conor on board, he recruited Adam and Ellie knowing of their love for cooking. Chilton said that the three “had no idea what they were going into, but it sounded like fun,” and with their positive attitudes, they took on the challenge.
The dinners, which began in November, have required that the three learn how to transition their cooking from small scale to large scale without sacrificing the quality of the meal.
Storck explained that a simple recipe they can cook for themselves usually needed to be multiplied by large numbers, and there were often difficult conversions. Timing has also been a learning lesson. “You know water takes a certain amount of time to boil, but boiling gallons of water for pounds of pasta really changes things,” said Chilton, “so it’s always important that we think of the timing of the meal and what needs to happen when. The preparation before cooking even begins is really important.”
Rather than rely on catering services, or buying bulk from the store, the trio works tirelessly to ensure that all of the food is locally sourced. These efforts have allowed them to extend beyond just forming connections with the senior class, and through meeting with farmers, working with community members at Fiddleheads and receiving support from the dining staff, the dinners are enhancing our community in more than one way.
The first dinner, a pot roast, involved 64 pounds of meat and more work than one could imagine. Contacting over fifteen farms, the group slowly learned that buying locally sourced food in bulk wasn’t as easy as they hoped. “I just kept receiving rejection e-mail after rejection e-mail until finally a farmer in Hudson Valley, New York offered us 57 pounds,” Quilty remembered, “so we had to drive six hours to go pick it up, but it was worth it.” Chilton and Quilty made the long journey to get the meat, and the first dinner was a success.
While the cooking involves a great deal of work, “it’s been a lot of fun,” Storck explains. “Everyone helps out. The three of us start out in the kitchen, and slowly our friends trickle in and pitch in wherever it’s needed.” The students’ willingness to help one another and get involved in creating a delicious meal is what makes the dinner unique and draws classmates closer.
The dinners, which began as a way for President Bergeron to connect with students before they graduate, have evolved into much more. Storck explained that students leave the dinners saying that they did not realize how many seniors they did not know. “People are good about branching out and meeting one another at the dinners,” she said.
Savannah Berger ’15 and Claire von Loescke ’15, who are responsible for the logistics and preparations of the dinners, recently began having students invite a professor to accompany them to the dinner. Quilty explained, “After the second dinner had a lower attendance, inviting professors was a good way to get more of the campus community involved.”
With so much hard work and dedication put into this dinner series it would be easy to believe that the three hope to continue this work into the future. When asked if he would want to work in the food service industry, Chilton said, “if anything, this has made me less interested. Being a part of the service industry is hard.” While all three have spent time working in kitchens and restaurants through summer jobs, it’s unlikely to be a part of their future. Storck shared that she plans to pursue food journalism, so this has been a great culinary experience.
Chilton, Storck and Quilty are working hard to establish the dinner as a legacy so that it can be passed on to the next class. Whether hand-making 36 pounds of pasta or getting creative making vegetarian dishes like barbeque tofu, the trio have mastered their roles as student chefs. •
