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Behind the Front Lines: Inside Discussions with Culinary Mavericks in America's Military
from National Culinary Review (May/June 2024)
by National Culinary Review (an American Culinary Federation publication)
BEHIND THE FRONT LINES
INSIDE DISCUSSIONS WITH CULINARY MAVERICKS
IN AMERICA’S MILITARY
By Amelia Levin
The ACF has enjoyed a decades-long partnership with the U.S. military dating back to the 1970s.
“The late Lt. General John D. McLaughlin did so much for military chefs; he paved the way with the help of the ACF to bring culinary arts to the forefront and make ours a profession of true talent rather than one of servants,” says ACF National President Chef René Marquis, CEC, CCE, CCA, AAC , a retired 21-year U.S. Army veteran, former enlisted aide for three- and fourstar generals and decorated military chef competitor who served through 15 deployments in 57 countries. “Even today the schoolhouse at Fort Gregg-Adams is called the McLaughlin Building.”
Chef Marquis adds that the military’s partnership with the ACF brings credibility to armed forces foodservice and serves as the backbone for culinary instruction and certification of members of the armed forces.
Each branch maintains its own methods for training cooks and culinarians depending on the nature of the service. But, once a year in the spring, the branches come together to compete against each other in the Joint Culinary Training Exercise, the largest military competition in the country held at Fort Gregg-Adams in Virginia (see Sidebar). Leaders from that competition are often chosen to be part of the U.S. Army
Culinary Arts Team (USACAT) that competes in the IKA/Culinary Olympics every four years.
“The enthusiasm and dedication of military culinarians is inspiring,” says retired Army Maj. Gen. Jeffrey Phillips , chair of the ACF Military Task Force created last year and a 36-year veteran of the U.S. Army currently serving as president of the nonprofit Reserve Organization of America. “Providing quality food to our troops directly contributes to military readiness, and one of my prime interests is enhancing an understanding of that value among senior military leaders.” Phillips says his main goal as the ACF Military Task Force chair is to continue to get the word out about ACF certifications among members of the military and also facilitate ACF civilian and military member visits to bases and installations to help train and teach future culinarians.
We caught up with some of those ACF military chefs to hear their stories about life on the front lines — and in the kitchen.
THE LIFE OF A GREEN BERET CHEF
ACF Chef Guy Winks, CEC , also serves on the ACF Military Task Force; he is a retired military chef of 25 years. As a former U.S. Army enlisted aide, he has also cooked fine dining meals for high-ranking generals in the U.S. Army. Most recently, Chef Winks, a longtime competitor whose team won the 2008 Installation of the Year at the JCTE, has served as a culinary instructor at the Joint Culinary Center of Excellence at Fort Gregg-Adams.
“Food is morale in military,” he says. “I’ve been in hostile areas where there are just 12 guys on a team and me, the cook, and a supply person and maybe a couple other support people, but that’s it. When you’ve been out crawling in the mud or trudging through the woods or dodging landmines or completing extreme cold weather missions, you see how much great food can change the whole atmosphere. When you go out of your way to cook a vegetarian meal for someone you know doesn’t eat meat or make someone’s omelet just like they like it in the morning and always have hot coffee running 24 hours a day, you know you’re doing your part as a chef in the armed forces.”
Chef Winks first got wind of the culinary world after going through initial occupational training at Fort Gregg-Adams (then Fort Lee). “I was
a young private who got put on detail washing dishes for the Culinary Olympic team,” he says. “I was immediately hooked and wanted to be a part of that.”
Considering himself “lucky to be in the right place at the right time,” Chef Winks was stationed at Fort Carson in 1995 and observed airborne military cooks for the Green Berets. “I went to their compound and asked how to be a cook,” he says. “The dining facility manager for the special forces said if I can decorate a cake for the grand opening of their compound I could gain acceptance into the unit. I went back to the artillery unit where I was stationed and asked the head chef to teach me how to do that. I managed to pull off the assignment and ended up in special forces for the next 14 years.”
During his career, Chef Winks also had the opportunity to go to the Culinary Institute of America as a military liaison for a year and earn ProChef Level II certification. In the 2010s, Chef Winks was as a member of the esteemed USACAT team and competed internationally at the Culinary Olympics in Germany and Expogast in Luxemburg, later becoming an advisor for the team. He was a coach for the team this year, and for the last 12 years, he has served as master of ceremony for the Joint Training Culinary Exercise at Fort Gregg-Adams.
“Winning gold medals is great, but what it all boils down to is better food for service members,” says Chef Winks. “We take kids from all branches of the military and train them to do advanced level cooking and represent the U.S. They get to go back to their bases and train others.”
THE LIFE OF AN ENLISTED AIDE
Master Sgt. David A. Marcelli, CCE, CEC, PCC, AAC , has been cooking since he was 14 and worked as a country club chef in his early 20s before joining the U.S. Army more than two decades ago and working up the ranks as an enlisted aide like Chef Winks.
“Stressful, demanding, challenging, satisfying, rewarding.” Those are the words Chef Marcelli uses to describe what it’s like to be a military chef. He’s been on four deployments (three to Iraq and one in Afghanistan) and has had to manage high-volume kitchens both on a base and in the field.
“Most of our military kitchens are set up to feed hundreds to thousands of service members; whereas a small restaurant kitchen may have one large steam jacket kettle to cook maybe 10 gallons of soup, a lot of our kitchens are set up with 100- to 200-gallon pots, several
tilt skillets and several industrial ovens all blazing away for most of the day to keep up with the demands,” he says.
As an enlisted aide stationed in Honolulu, Hawaii, “We entertain foreign dignitaries, senators and foreign senior military liaisons from all over the world,” Chef Marcelli says. “One of the coolest things I’ve gotten to do most recently was work with the Japanese consulate here to build foreign relations — their military team recently came here to help us with one of our functions.”
Outside of his regular duties Chef Marcelli has taught culinary arts classes at Fort Gregg-Adams and participated in several culinary competitions while serving in the military. “I was a support member of the 2012 United States Army Culinary Arts Team (USACAT), which competed in the 2012 Olympics in Erfurt, Germany, and I have competed personally in the Fort Gregg-Adams Joint Culinary Training Exercise, winning ACF gold in nutrition and several other individual and team medals.
A founding member of the newly created ACF Military Task Force, Chef Marcelli hopes to “dispel myths about the ACF among new military cooks that it’s not some secret club that you can only be a part of if you are a senior rank,” he says. “The ACF has done so much for the military and military chefs that I think it’s important to share best practices and continue to help each other.”
FEEDING THE NAVY
Senior Chief Petty Officer Michael Edwards, CEC , joined the U.S. Navy shortly after 9/11 at the age of 30 after owning a catering company in California for several years.
He started his naval career feeding crews on aircraft carriers, providing four meals per day, 24 hours a day, for up to 5,000 people. That’s when he transitioned to a captain’s cook, which is similar to an enlisted aide position but on board a carrier. At one point, Chef Edwards served as secretary of the Navy mess at the Pentagon. He has taught advanced culinary arts at Fort Gregg-Adams.
Chef Edwards, who says he’s currently serving the highest ranking admiral in the Navy, also acts like an “estate manager,” coordinating any work that has to be done in the house in addition to serving as a private chefin-charge. “I’ve done events up to 3,000 people and as small an evening as two people sitting at a table. I’ve cooked everything from simple casseroles to 12-course fine dining meals.”
Lately, as a member of the ACF Military Task Force,
“We teach the same curriculum that you would get at any culinary school, but we have to do it in a more condensed timeframe because we have to get people out to the fleet, so our program takes place over the course of 13 weeks,” Chef Fuchs says. Culinary specialists can continue their education on the job as a line cook (or duty cook) while also learning “firefighting, navigation, line handling, rigging and all those other skills necessary to be successful on a cutter. If you’re an honor grad for a graduating class, you’re going to get your No. 1 pick, and then so on down the line depending on how well you perform in your school. With our advancement being performance driven, you can advance to the next pay grade through continued study and performance on the job.”
HOW AIRMEN FEED THE U.S. AIR FORCE
ACF Chef Jazmen Davis, CWPC , technical sergeant, oversees culinary instruction for the U.S. Air Force at Fort Gregg-Adams in Virginia and enjoys teaching new recruits the fundamentals of cooking.
“I enjoy getting people excited about food because I think when people join the military, especially the Air Force, they think they’re going to jump out of planes and do things like that, so many of them are shocked when they get assigned the job of cooking,” says Chef Davis, explaining that this military branch is different from others in that airmen are assigned jobs — they don’t choose them — and they rotate frequently.
At Fort Gregg-Adams there are two main kitchens, including a demo lab for basic culinary instruction that lasts about a week.
“Then we take the training wheels off and have everyone take a menu and feed about 60 people at a time and then switch them to a bigger kitchen,” says Chef Davis, noting that her team teaches about 900 airmen per year and can have between 60 and 80 students in a class.
“By the time they leave their duty station, they will know how to do batch cooking and mass cooking, and they will also spend time in our field kitchens.” Within six months students might have their first deployment, so they’re trained not just on cooking but also on airplane mechanics and other duties.
The Air Force does send airmen to compete at the Joint Culinary Training Exercise at Fort Gregg-Adams, says Chef Davis, but she’s always looking for more participation. “I feel like there is a lot of hidden talent in our kitchens so
we’re trying to identify those [airmen] and give them opportunities to compete. There are also opportunities for airmen to work in the field.”
“For my first duty station I was stationed in Las Vegas and we had a partnership with the casinos so I was able to work as an intern at the bakery at Caesar’s Palace,” she says. “By the end of the internship I was baking cakes for celebrities like Mike Tyson, Wayne Brady and Celine Dion. Those experiences and certifications are definitely a stepping stone for transitioning to civilian life after serving in the military so we’ve been working hard getting the word out about the ACF and the certifications offered.”
ACF member Edward Manley, a retired U.S. Navy lieutenant commander and culinary/foodservice management trainer, says the partnership between ACF and the military is critical. “It’s so important to connect with our military members, especially the younger ones, and encourage them to get involved in ACF. There are wonderful jobs in foodservice as a member of the U.S. military, but not everyone knows that. From some of the research I’ve done, those who earn certifications are three times more likely to get promoted to [higher ranks like] E7, E8 and E9.”
Chef Marcelli shares the same goals as a member of the ACF Military Task Force. “I hope to dispel myths about the ACF among new military cooks that it’s not some secret club that you can only be a part of if you are a senior rank,” he says. “The ACF has done so much for the military and military chefs that I think it’s important to share best practices and continue to help each other.”
