Hundreds attended the Wasatch Community Foundation’s seventh annual A Day of Thanksgiving celebration at Timpanogos Middle School Saturday. The event features live music, games, booths to learn about the local health and police departments and a winter clothing drive.
There is also a Thanksgiving dinner made by Wasatch High School culinary students.
Hours before residents arrived, the Timpanogos kitchen was bustling with students cooking potatoes, green beans, stuffing and turkey.
The students are part of a class called ProStart, a concurrent enrollment Utah Valley University course where they earn college credit while in high school.
Teacher Emily Willardson said the Thanksgiving celebration kept getting bigger and bigger and organizers needed help making enough food. So her culinary students were enlisted to help several years ago.
Willardson said the students like being involved.
“I used to require them to be here for a 4-hour shift, and they just stayed the whole time. No one left,” she said. “Now I don't even say ‘this is how long,’ just show up at this time, and they do, and they stay and work till the end.”
This year, 15 students made the Thanksgiving meal under the guidance of Willardson and Brigham Young University Executive Chef John McDonald. McDonald volunteers to help teach the students about how large-scale kitchen machinery works and to organize stations.
“We separated all the products that we had to prep, and we basically designated which items need to start first,” McDonald said.
Potatoes take longer to cook, so they go first. Then, students gather ingredients for the stuffing and open the cans of beans. When the 40 turkey breasts are cooked, McDonald said he shows students how to stage and cut them.
Student Jordan Meatelaar was on turkey duty. He said he and his classmates save the turkey drippings to flavor the stuffing. His favorite part is feeding the community.
“I did this last year. I just really like seeing the people's faces when we serve them the food,” he said.
Dune Verbeno Butler was sifting powdered sugar to make frosting for the pumpkin sheet cakes.
“We've gone through several bags already. It's a kind of a bit of a strenuous process,” Butler said.
The cakes themselves were actually made over the two weeks before the dinner. Willardson said her students measured out all the ingredients and baked the cakes during class so they have more time to cook other items the day of the celebration.
And the dinner is always a big hit. When the food was ready, friends, families and residents lined up to fill their plates.
Andres Mares and his family joined the celebration for the first time this year. His daughter is in the Latinos in Action club. The group helped with the feast, making holiday cards for the community’s senior citizens.
“I like the community, the food, talk with other guys. It's really good,” Mares said.
Mares said the highlight was the Thanksgiving meal. He loved the turkey and stuffing, but time with family and friends is what he’s most thankful for this year.
