By way of update, I am now enrolled in the Professional Culinary Institute’s Essential Professional Culinary Skills Program, which began on November 29th (the PCI is now a branch campus of the French Culinary Institute in NYC). Up until enrolling in the PCI, I have had concern that I was not adequately preparing myself for my career path this year. Although I will still be completing high school concurrently (one advantage of being a homeschooler), I believe starting the PCI culinary program now give me a head start on accomplishing my objectives.
My career goal is to be a chef/restaurateur. I will seek to eventually own and operate a restaurant, because this model will best fit within the entrepreneurial business framework I have embraced. While my previous plan was to take the “school of hard knocks” route, which would mean directly entering the restaurant industry without formal instruction (comparatively common within the industry), after receiving solid advice, and giving the matter more thought, I have come to believe that receiving formal culinary instruction at the PCI will enable me to realize my goal sooner.
The PCI culinary program, which is both accelerated, and includes no general education, uses an approach to teaching called Artisense, which entails a high emphasis on the demonstration and execution of technique and procedure. Other factors which influenced my choice of the PCI include the small class size (16 students maximum), small and personal school environment, opportunities to work with instructors off-hours on extracurricular activities, and the fact that the school is only about 5 minutes drive from home, which will enable me to remain engaged in home life.
I have been in school two weeks thus far, week one covering safety and sanitation through ServSafe training; week two we began Essential Skills 1, which covers the fundamentals of cooking.
Deciphering Cuisine 
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