Students make recipes for annual Port Angeles School District challenge
Published 1:30 am Friday, March 6, 2026
PORT ANGELES — Smoked salmon stuffed peppers. Caesar salad with shrimp. Green enchiladas. Even banana split cake.
It might sound like the menu at a nice restaurant, but they were among the dishes prepared Wednesday by Port Angeles School District fourth- and fifth-graders who were competing in the 2026 Future Chefs Challenge at Port Angeles High School.
Nine students prepared recipes they had submitted for consideration in January, receiving assistance from district food service staff, while members of the Port Angeles School Board observed the cooking and served as judges.
Sodexo, the district’s food service provider, sponsors the annual contest and provides the ingredients.
Picking the winners wasn’t easy.
“They were all good,” board director Stan Williams said.
Joshua Shiepko, a Hamilton Elementary fourth-grader, received the Health Attributes Award for his Caesar salad with shrimp. Lilah Jones, a fifth-grader at Dry Creek Elementary, won Best Taste for her “Mean Green Machine Enchiladas.”
The grand prize went to Hamilton fifth-grader Valen Atwater for “Po-Po’s Perfectly Pearly Meatballs.”
Atwater’s recipe will advance to a regional competition with entries from 475 school districts across six western states that are served by Sodexo.
The top 10 recipes from each of three regions will be selected, with three finalists ultimately chosen to prepare their dishes on video for a panel of professional chefs. One overall winner will then be named.
Atwater said the dish is a family recipe passed down from his grandmother to his mother, Vivian Wai.
Preparing it took some work, he said, including slicing ginger, water chestnuts, carrots and green onions and forming sticky rice into balls.
Wai said her son practiced making the recipe the night before the challenge — Tuesday was the final day of the Chinese Lantern Festival, when eating round foods is considered good luck.
For the past four years, recipes created by students in the Future Chefs Challenge have been incorporated into district meal menus, allowing the dishes to live on beyond the competition.
Students who received medals for their participation were Avery Butcher, fourth grade, Roosevelt Elementary, smoked salmon stuffed peppers; Lindsey Corpuz, fifth grade, Dry Creek Elementary, trio flavor ramen; Wesley Degoede, fourth grade, Hamilton Elementary, mini cheeseburgers; Silas DuPuis, fourth grade, Franklin Elementary, “hungry” goulash; Clair Lang, fifth grade, Roosevelt Elementary, Clair’s cookies; and Catherine Purcell, fourth grade, Roosevelt Elementary, banana split cake.
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Reporter Paula Hunt can be reached by email at paula.hunt@peninsuladailynews.com.
