A team of talented students from Penta Career Center, including Anthony Wayne’s Violet Lowe and teammates Elysa Oman (Bowling Green), Ashley Helvey (Springfield), Adriana Urbina (Springfield), and Aubree Talley-DeMoe (Maumee), took the top spot in the Culinary category in the Ohio ProStart Invitational’s Culinary Competition on March 11. Competing against 13 other high school teams at the Delaware County Fairgrounds, the team became the first from Penta to earn a trip to the national competition.
About the Ohio ProStart Invitational
The Ohio ProStart Invitational is the largest interscholastic culinary competition in the state, bringing together the best high school culinary and management teams. In the Culinary Competition, students are challenged to prepare a three-course meal using only butane burners—without access to electricity or running water. The event demands precision, teamwork and creativity, as participants must execute complex dishes under strict time constraints.
Anthony Wayne’s Violet Lowe: Student Leader & Aspiring Chef
Violet Lowe, a senior from AWHS has already made a name for herself beyond the competition. A two-year student in Penta Career Center’s Culinary Arts program, Violet is also deeply involved in career and technical education organizations. She was recently named the Region 3 Vice President for SkillsUSA at the National Leadership and Skills Conference in Atlanta, GA, where she represents students from seven states.
Violet’s passion for the culinary arts extends beyond the classroom. She also volunteers with the SAME (So All May Eat) Cafe in Downtown Toledo. The nonprofit organization operates on a pay-what-you-can model with a mission of providing access to healthy, appealing food to everyone, regardless of their ability to pay.
“I like working with them because I’m passionate about their mission. They combine high quality food with supporting people,” she said. “This organization puts together really flavorful, healthy, unique meals every day and caters to a diverse audience to make it more accessible to people of all backgrounds.”
Following graduation, Violet plans to attend Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island, to further her culinary education. Her long-term goal is to gain international experience and ultimately work in a Michelin-starred restaurant. With experience and interest in event planning, she also envisions incorporating hospitality management into her future career.
We talked with Violet about the competition experience:
What inspired you to explore cooking and fine dining?
Violet: It was a combination of factors. In junior high I was in Ms. Schaller’s Principles of Foods class and did a lot of cooking at home. I learned a lot about the nutrition aspect of food in that class. I had just switched to a plant-based diet, and was figuring out how to make meals for myself. I was doing a lot of research. I later made the choice to continue down this path at Penta.
I’m also inspired by Eleven Madison Park, a plant-based restaurant in New York City. It was the first vegan restaurant to become a Three Star Michelin restaurant. It was special to me because it was the same time that I started on that journey, and it was exciting to see that the food I enjoy is something that can be appreciated at that level.
I also follow a lot of food-based accounts on Instagram. My feed is filled with beautiful meals.
Tell me about the ProStart Competition.
Violet: ProStart has been an experience! We started in November with a class competition to determine who would be on the team. And for the first time, we had an all-female team that was a blend of juniors and seniors.
We got to work developing our recipes for an appetizer, main entree and a dessert. It’s a lot of trial and error. We explored new techniques and food combinations to see what we wanted to create, and then worked through developing the official menus and costing for the dishes.
Through the process, we were looking for fresh ideas to bring to competition. We wanted something interesting and new. I suggested that we take inspiration from my family’s Native American heritage and focus on a theme of indigenous foods from this region. We did a LOT of research on what foods were here and narrowed our region and time period to be as authentic as possible.
We practiced in the morning and evening all the way through January and February to prepare. We ran into some of the normal team setbacks, but we felt prepared going into the competition.
What does the competition look like?
Violet: Four people cook, with one person working as the team manager. They cannot cook or touch anything. They keep an eye on the clock and keep us on track. I was in charge of making the appetizer. We get 20 minutes to set up our workstation and measure ingredients, and then just one hour to cook.
We went into it feeling good and prepared. I have done enough competitions to know that at the end of the day the result is ultimately in the judges’ hands. At the end of the day, it’s about what they think.
The first 20 minutes of cooking was looking good, but I started to see that we were falling behind and things weren’t getting done on time. Then we started to make little mistakes everywhere, and I didn’t think we would get it done. My appetizer takes less time to prepare, so I was trying to help everywhere I could. We finished – hands up – with 40 seconds left. Everything was on the plates and was beautiful. It was a moment to breathe before going into the tasting portion.
What did the judges say?
Violet: The first judge’s feedback on the appetizer was that it was “amazing.” I was hoping for more constructive feedback, so I asked what else I could do to improve it. The judge just said, “If I ordered this in a restaurant, I would be pleased and order it again.”
The entree judge was over the moon and loved it, and we got similar reviews for the dessert.
I was hoping for more useful feedback, and it seemed too nice to be true. We were the first group to compete, so we had to hang out and wait for the other teams to compete until awards.
What was it like hearing that you won?
Violet: After waiting all afternoon, we found out that the awards ceremony was running late. It finally started, but they announced the smaller awards first. I earned the best knife cuts award and won a knife set, which was great. I wasn’t really expecting it, but it also made me think that it was the only award we would get.
We finally get to the management and culinary competition winners, and they finally get to the top three. We get to second place and they call the name of the school who has won the competition for the past five years. That left first place, and when they called our name we jumped up – so excited. The organizers said that our reaction was one of the best they have seen.
We went up on stage to get our beautiful trophy - it was incredible.
What are you expecting from the national competition?
Violet: We will travel to Baltimore, Maryland in May. It’s going to be a great experience. The competition is hosted by the National Restaurant Association and the judges are master chefs. Last year, they gave out over $850,000 in scholarships. Our goal is to finish in the top 5, but we are the first Penta team to make it to nationals.
We are looking at tweaking our menu slightly to adjust to the season change, and we want to elevate our dessert. We think it’s too rustic to take to the national competition.
What is the secret sauce to being successful in competition?
Violet: It’s a lot of work and the team has to care. You have to put in 110% and believe in your teammates. Open communication is important, compromise is a big deal and you have to be able to take constructive criticism. You have to be open to experimenting and knowing that we are all here to push each other. You have to focus on the little improvements. If we did better today than yesterday, then we are making progress.
Do you have advice for other aspiring culinary students?
Violet: Every second matters in competition. If you want to perform well, it’s important to get the background knowledge and fundamentals down. Learn and practice cooking techniques and knife skills. That way, you can rely on muscle memory kicking in and you can focus on the process and think about how to help your teammates instead. It’s also important to keep up with trends and knowing what’s current in food and plating techniques - it can help a plate come to life. If you immerse yourself in it, it will help you in the long run.