The Charter School Chef

From The City Paper, reporter Laura Hayes, Oct 17, 2018. For the full stort, and more on other food stories in this article, go here. To see the Elsie Whitlow Stokes ES school lunch menu for October go here. A few of the October lunch main courses are: Tikka Masala Chicken; Jerk Chicken/Jerk Tofu; Peruvian Chicken; Greek Pasta Salad.

And here's the article from The City Paper.

When students at Elsie Whitlow Stokes stream into the cafeteria this Thursday, they'll get trays with sesame noodle salad, a hard boiled egg, roasted greens and red peppers, a peach cup, and milk. The Brookland charter school only serves meals cooked on the premises. “A select few schools do scratch cooking,” says head chef Chris Headecker. “[Other schools] don’t have a kitchen in the building. They might just have warming stations or kitchenette space because they outsource their food.”               
The D.C. native who is half Brazilian and half Guyanese thought he wanted a career in criminal justice, but rechanneled his passion for helping by putting his childhood love of cooking to use. He graduated from Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School’s culinary program in 2010 and has been employed at E.W. Stokes ever since—advancing from intern to boss.

His alarm chirps at 3 a.m. so he can be in the kitchen by 4 a.m., ready for a day of preparing breakfast for 450 people, lunch for 750 people, and supper for 250 participants in the after school program. The school has students from Pre-K up through 5th grade, and staff often eat Headecker’s menu.

In dreaming up dishes like Peruvian tofu and taco casserole, Headecker must follow USDA dietary requirements, but he finds ways to stay on trend, like participating in Meatless Monday, and he lets loose on Friday by serving crowd-pleasing pizza or burgers.