The Careers through Culinary Arts Program (C-CAP) is the charitable beneficiary of Manhattan Beach Food & Wine. Lisa Fontanesi is the long-time Los Angeles Director. We’ll meet her.
“Led by chef, author and restaurateur Marcus Samuelsson as national Board Co-chair, Careers C-CAP transforms the lives of underserved high school students and young people around the country by helping them pursue their culinary dreams. C-CAP prepares these talented young adults for college, and for careers in the restaurant and hospitality industry.”
Annually, C-CAP provides culinary, job and life skills to over 22,000 middle-and-high school students across the entire state of Arizona, as well as in Baltimore, Camden, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, New York City & Long Island, Newark, Philadelphia, suburban Maryland, and Washington DC.
Good morning Southern California and welcome. If you're food obsessed you've come to the right place. Join us for the next two hours and you won't go away hungry. One of the first American culinary icons, Junior Childs said, "People who love to eat are always the best people." We agree. Live today from the boutique West Rift Manhattan Beach and Autograph Collection Hotel, the official hotel of Manhattan Beach Food and Wine. The SoCal Restaurant Show is on the air. And welcome back. It is our two of the SoCal Restaurant Show but it is a very special show. We are celebrating this morning the 12th anniversary of the launch of the SoCal Restaurant Show and we're celebrating at the inaugural Manhattan Beach Food and Wine Festival. Tonight is the last night of the event. It is the grand tasting. It is right down the street from where we are now at the West Drift at Manhattan Plaza. And I just love our remote location. We are overlooking their nine whole par three golf course. And it is amazing in Manhattan Beach to have a property this large because I got to believe the highest and best use of this expansive golf course is probably not a nine whole golf course. And I'm delighted that it is preserved from being developed because boy, do we love the open space. Again, I want to acknowledge the hospitality of the West Drift Manhattan Beach, which is an autograph collection hotel. They are hosting our remote this morning and we have had to ask for nothing. They have a really great staff here and they're on top of it. And coming from the luxury hotel business many, many years ago, I really appreciate good service where you find it. Also, I want to recognize the whole team that is here at the remote. We have Mike Boyle, who is to my right, who is the chief engineer of AMA 30, who is kind enough to come out this morning because he wanted to make sure this went well. And of course, back in the control room in AMA 30 in Anaheim, we have Tony in technical excellence. So we appreciate everybody as far as that's concerned. Now, Manhattan Beach Food and Wine, this is a great opportunity to have food that you will not be able to get anywhere else. And also do meet and greet with the best chefs that are in Los Angeles, plus a lot of chefs from out of area that unless you went to New York Vancouver or New Orleans, you're not going to get their food. But there's a serious purpose to this. And there is a serious charitable beneficiary. Anyone that's listened to this show for any period of time knows that I'm a big supporter of the careers through culinary arts program. And we have a chance to spend a few minutes with Lisa Fontenese, who is the LA director. She's been there over a decade. And she will explain what the CCAP involvement in Manhattan Beach Food and Wine is. But in addition to being a monetary beneficiary of this event, it's also a great opportunity for CCAP students. Lisa is always it is a pleasure to welcome you back to the SoCal restaurant show. You were everywhere last night. Tell us a little bit about how the CCAP kids are involved in this event because it's something very meaningful. It is good morning. Thank you for having me in person and it is absolutely stunning today. So yes, first of all, big thank you to Lawrence Moore and Shelby Russell for inviting CCAP to the inaugural event to be their charity partner. And we received a beautiful $10,000 donation. Some of it will go to scholarships to our students this year. And the rest is to help our program expand and grow. But the best part of last night and this evening is each evening. We're having 25 students come out and work hands-on, one-on-one with the chefs. Be mentored. Then in 9.30 in the evening, they were all welcomed onto the stage. And just truly, when they showed up at 4 o'clock in the afternoon after being at a full day of school, yesterday we had three of our more South Bay schools. So we had Browning, Richard D Browning High School from Long Beach. We had Banning High School from Wilmington and we had Lusinger High School from Hawthorne. And they brought 25 students. And they were shy and quiet and a little scared. And we fed them thanks again to Lawrence and just delicious chicken from, I believe, it's box brothers. But they enjoyed it and they were being videotaped tasting it. Then we dressed them up and paraded them around to meet all the chefs. And then they started working. And what I noticed and saw and was privileged to was people coming up to me and saying how great your kids are. This is amazing. And they're dressed in their sea cap jackets. And then they're in there, which is donated by chef works. And they're in their hats with sea cap. And then they had the Manhattan Beach aprons on. So they're dressed. They're in their uniform. They're ready to work. And then just all the amazing chefs, Neil and David and Sherry and Elizabeth Faulkner, just walking them through what to do and how to do it and letting them serve and letting them talk. And then wonderfully, one of the chefs was our own Dustin Traney, who went through the program in San Pedro, the sea cap program. He owns two restaurants. Tonight, we have Hyrule Martinez, another sea cap alum, but a beautiful accident was one of our alumni who started working with Antonio LaFossa five or six years ago through our job training program is now an executive sue. And she was out there number twoing the Antonio LaFossa table, Mirelanda from Dorsey High School. So we get to see sea cap in its prime doing what it's supposed to do, which is be the bridge and help support these wonderful chefs that support us. But we're bringing the next generation to restaurants and hospitality. Lisa, obviously very exciting. Now, Los Angeles, of course, I think was the second area that had a sea cap program. But just to let our listeners know, this is a national endeavor. So besides New York and Los Angeles, what other areas of the country have sea cap programs? So we have the entire state of Arizona. We have Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C. And then now we are also expanding into Florida. And I believe they are working on, there is another location in Dallas, I'm sorry, Dallas are the next locations that are coming on board. And so it's really exciting. It's an amazing program. Marcus Samuelson is our chef co-chair of our national board. And so he's been helping and pushing to get us expanding into some of these amazing locations. And then Tanya Steele and Jennifer Solomon are two co-executive people on the national level, really working hard to get our program more and more known. But locally, we all work so hard, like boots on the ground with our students, with our chefs. And each location has amazing, unique opportunities. And that's what our job is. And that's what my job is, is to just keep growing the program, get our students out there, and support these amazing chefs that support us. Lisa, let's talk about some of the results of LA, which I know you're very proud of. Sea cap is a lot more than an annual scholarship program. But I never get tired of talking about the scholarship program. So for this year at the awards breakfast, how many students got scholarships? And what was the total value of the scholarships that were donated this year just for the greater LA area? Sure. So just for LA, just to give a little back up, it's a two-part process to cooking competitions. We had 115 juniors and seniors participate in prelims. And then we move on about 36 seniors, and then we award two special scholarships to juniors. So at the awards breakfast, 36 seniors, two juniors were awarded over $720,000 worth of scholarships. Lisa, as I say, I never get tired of hearing that. Now, for those sea camp students that don't necessarily want to pursue an academic career or further academia, what can sea cap do to help them that are still interested in getting involved in the hospitality industry? Absolutely. So post-secondary is one of the things we offer. But we also are a, through the Department of Labor, a pass-through apprenticeship program for Cook 1, Baking 1, and Hospitality. So there is the national apprenticeship program that we have. We work with Marriott hotels, we work with the Jonathan Club. We're just partnering with, oh, this is great. Who did we just go visit this two days ago down in Santa Barbara? You were with, that was the Ritz Carlton Cara. Thank you. Yes. So Ritz Carlton, thank you very much, a little early this morning. And just some great rest, Neil, chef, Neil Frazier, takes our students. So that's one. We do a job training program for kids 15 and a half and older, where we put them in internships. Yesterday afternoon or evening after the kids working, I heard four or five students were offered opportunities. A few were so young that they were like, "Call us in three years, but you have a job." So, I mean, this is what sea cap is about. And even if they're not going into this industry, we really feel that the skills we give them, just how to meet people, how to feed their families, how to write a resume, a cover letter, how to shake someone's hand and look in their eyes, is going to help them in whatever it is they do. So that's really what sea cap is about, is supporting the youth today. And it may be through culinary, but it doesn't have to be that that's their pathway. Well, at least you bring up a very important point. This, the culinary program that sea cap does for high school students, this is kind of a good proof of concept for them because some of these young people find that this really isn't what they want to do and it's great for them to be able to know that now versus, you know, wasting time going down the wrong path. And as we've been talking about all morning, as much as we love the hospitality industry and we appreciate chefs and restaurateurs, this is not necessarily an easy life and you really need to embrace it going into it because they're easier ways to make a living. Yes. So I mean, we find it a win if we have a young person come out and go, this is not for me. They're still part of sea cap. We'll help figure other things. The other beauty of what we do and in this Thursday coming up, we're doing an industry panel in Mission College. We don't call it a chef's panel anymore because we invite people from all aspects of hospitality, culinary, food TV, food science, photography, all these sort of things and show them there's so many different paths. So they don't have to just be in a kitchen or in a hotel. It can be business, real estate, doing a radio show, all these sort of things. So that's our job is to just open pathways and ideas. And again, if it's not for them, yay, we've helped them maybe save a whole lot of time and money going down the wrong path. But we're there to see how we can help them. And that's what we love doing. We have an amazing staff of four amazing women. And we all work hard and we're all second, third and fourth moms to these students. And we love what we do. Well, Lisa, nobody could have said it better than you have. I've been involved in sea cap for 20 years now. And it is just gratifying to see how the program is grown and evolved in L.A. The need is obviously out there. Obviously, chefs and restaurateurs have a new appreciation for sea cap after the pandemic. We're sorry that had to happen. But all of a sudden, I'll see campus top of mind and there's nothing wrong with that is we need to say goodbye Lisa because we have chef Hyrule waiting in the wings. What is the best website for listeners to get more information about sea cap? Sea cap. It's www dot c cap ink dot o-r-g. Yeah, the dot o-r-g is what's important. Lisa, again, what a wonderful success for sea cap this event. We're going to do it again tonight for the grand tasting. It's going to be even bigger. And I look forward to seeing you out there. Thank you. And thank you for always supporting us, Andy. You're the best. My pleasure. You are listening to the special anniversary edition of the So Cal restaurant show 12 years. Who would believe it? We're going to be back in a moment with chef Hyrule Martinez of Westwood Coast Steakhouse in Costa Mesa. We're proudly presented by Melissa's World Variety Proters and West Coast Prime Meats. Don't wander far. [MUSIC PLAYING]
