Contact Jim Murray
KP Director of Sales and Marketing
800.701.6323 x914

More than 600 schools are now using the Sous Chef™ culinary education resource across North America, the company recently announced.  “We are very pleased that our phenomenal growth rate is continuing into 2007,” said Nai Wang.

“This means over 20,000 students now have access to the Sous Chef™ system as part of their training in culinary technique and knowledge,” said Wang, president and spokesman for KP Systems, the publishers and distributors of the Sous Chef™. “This reinforces our strong belief that we have designed and produced the first, and best, multimedia educational program in the entire culinary field.”

Both secondary and post-secondary students are the primary users of the computer-based system. The Sous Chef™ is an education tool designed to enhance training in cooking techniques and skills for students, professional and home learners.

"The Sous Chef™ is unlike any other teaching resource available. Educators show tremendous interest and positive reactions to the product," said Wang, explaining the continuing double-digit growth in schools purchasing and adopting the product.

The Sous Chef™ is a complete system for teaching culinary skills. It contains more than 250 videos explaining and demonstrating all areas of cooking and food preparation.  It also has 1,000 text pages/slides and over 1,100 photos/diagrams/illustrations.  All of this material can be viewed by an entire class on large monitors or screen projectors, or it can be accessed on PCs by individual students or small groups.

The Sous Chef™ was written and produced based on decades of classroom and teaching experience. It is designed to offer “in the classroom” support to instructors who have a broad spectrum of experience and culinary skills, according to Wang.   “One of our users told us, ‘You make chefs better teachers…and you make teachers better chefs.’”

“This system can enhance, or even replace, traditional textbook-based curricula in high schools, colleges, and vocational schools and programs,” said Dominic O’Neill, principal author and instructor for The Sous Chef™. Chef O’Neill is director of the Culinary Arts Program at Scottsdale Community College in Arizona.
         
The system mixes classic culinary knowledge and techniques with the latest in e-learning (computer-based) technology, said Chef O’Neill. While traditional culinary instruction is at the heart of the Sous Chef™ system, KP Systems believes their computer-based program is a huge improvement in supporting teachers.

Imagine learning a specific kitchen job -- dicing an onion, preparing salad dressing, grilling a chop. Like any textbook, The Sous Chef™ will tell you how. Unlike any other text, however, The Sous Chef™ also shows you how. After reading about the process, click on a bar and O’Neill, or another master chef, display the technique on video, demonstrating and explaining from beginning to end.

The Sous Chef™ system is used like a book. The program opens with a view of the title page; from there, you choose and click on a chapter.  Each chapter begins with an overview and a listing of competencies taught in that section. Then you either scroll through each “slide” or “page” in the section or use the complete index to find the exact lesson you are seeking.

“The Sous Chef approach offers a number of advantages to both teacher and student,” said O’Neill. “Most importantly, it eliminates repetitive demonstrations. Students who miss a kitchen demonstration or need multiple viewings can watch a video as often as they wish.  We have over 250 separate videos demonstrating everything from simple knife cuts to advanced ice carving.”

KP president Wang said that O’Neill drew on his more than 30 years cooking and teaching experience to make the Sous Chef™ a complete two-year culinary curriculum. “This program is a refinement of the thousands of culinary arts classes that Dominic has taught,” said Wang.

O’Neill has not only taught students – he has taught teachers. “Chef O’Neill, in addition to teaching thousands of college and high school students, has also instructed hundreds of secondary level teachers who then take his techniques back to their own classrooms,” continued Wang.

The Sous Chef™ can be of special help in working with all types of learners. Advanced students can have access to culinary topics and techniques that might not be applicable for the entire class.

Instructors can audiovisually reinforce material for struggling students or slower learners by offering them repeated viewings that might not continue to engage the entire classroom.