"I haven't had this much fun since kindergarten!" exclaimed Johnson & Wales University (JWU) Providence campus president Dr. Irving Schneider as he decorated a heart-shaped sugar cookie for donation with a group of students and chef-instructors in the Smart Cookies! class last week.
Smart Cookies! is a collaboration between JWU's Feinstein Community Service Center and Drop In & Decorate. Created by chef-instructors Linda Kane, Michelle Pugh and David Rocheleau, Smart Cookies! introduces students during their required week of community service to one way their creativity and compassion can make a difference.
In Smart Cookies!, which meets every Monday at St. Charles soup kitchen in South Providence, the students -- majoring in culinary or hospitality -- get to "follow the cookie".
After a brief demonstration of a few basic icing techniques by chef Michelle Pugh, the students decorate basic sugar cookies, baked by the university's commissary.
Those cookies are set aside to dry, and then stored until the following week.
Meanwhile, the cookies decorated the week before are wrapped and delivered to nonprofit agencies throughout the Providence area.
Each week, 100 brightly decorated cookies, individually wrapped and tied with colorful ribbon, find their way to agencies meeting the basic human needs of food or shelter.
Special thanks to Dr. Schneider, Feinstein Center director Susan Connery, commissary executive chef Jennifer Schouppe, and chefs Linda, Michelle and David, and all of the Johnson & Wales students who have decorated and donated to hundreds of Providence-area families in need this semester.
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